Comments on: How to Make Kefir

By: Donielle

Donielle — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 10:50:00 +0000

Candace, while I do understand the concept that heat is bad, mine will absolutely not turn out unless it is warmed to room temp first. Seriously – every time I tossed the grains into cold milk, it turns to cream cheese and whey, definitely not kefir. So I found a recommendation to warm the milk (only to room temp – I guess really I could just let it sit out for an hour first huh? But alas I never think that far ahead. And I never warm it with the kefir grains in it, just the milk.)
I’ve recently let my grains sit way to long, so when I’m able to get new ones, I’m gonna try it with the cold milk again. My thinking is now that it’s colder in the house maybe….I don’t know – we’ll see!

And I have noticed I do not like it as sour as it gets when I leave the grains unwashed each time.

Thanks for your comment!

By: Candace @ A Garden of Blessings

Candace @ A Garden of Blessings — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 02:11:00 +0000

Hi Donielle,
Here via Frugal Granola.
I have been making kefir for about 2 years now.
I have never heated my milk up, in fact, kefir does not like heat.
I keep it on the counter for a day and then into the fridge for a day and it is nice and creamy.
I have never rinsed my grains (or put them in water), I was told not to by the lady who gave them to me.
I have left them in a good amount of milk in the fridge for several weeks at a time and they are fine when I feed them again. The kefir that is produced is very sour though, and I give it to my dog.
A lot of people do it differently and I think the only thing you can do wrong is use heat or metal on the grains.
Your blog is great!

By: Donielle

Donielle — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 00:35:00 +0000

Alison – yikes! $15.00 a gallon! Definite ouch. When I had to buy pasteurized goat milk at the store before I could find it at a local farm we had to pay 16.00 a gallon. Now I only pay $7.00. Raw cow milk is $5.00 a gallon for me so I use it to make kefir and such cause it’s cheaper, but not for my kiddo to drink as he can’t tolerate digesting the proteins in it. Let me know how the kefir goes, maybe I’m totally doing something wrong!

By: Alison @ Wholesome Goodness

Alison @ Wholesome Goodness — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:45:00 +0000

Donielle,

Oh, good point about the homogenization. I’ve only used goats’ milk so far. That will change soon, as I can no longer afford the $15/gallon price tag for goats’ milk with all of my other grocery expenses going up. When we have children, I’ll reconsider because the goats’ milk is so much easier for them to digest, but for now, I’m going to start buying only raw cows’ milk. I’m curious now to see how the kefir-making goes with it.

By: Donielle

Donielle — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 20:04:00 +0000

Alison, I also got ours from our raw milk farmer! We drink goat milk but she had these in cow milk, so I’ve just kept using cow milk for it so as not to have a few batches that tasted kind of blah.

With the cow milk I’ve had it turn to cheese right away instead of kefir so now I just warm it to room temp first (about 65-75 degrees) and it seems to work better. And warming it to only room temp in a bowl of hot water shouldn’t be damaging any of the healthy benefits of the raw milk so I don’t worry about that. I don’t know if it’s the fact that it’s not naturally homogenized, like the goat milk is, or if I just had a few weird batches and was doing it wrong, but I haven’t had any issues since.

By: Alison @ Wholesome Goodness

Alison @ Wholesome Goodness — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 19:34:00 +0000

Another good place to find kefir grains is through a raw dairy farmer. I got mine through my goats’ milk provider. Unfortunately, I’ve neglected them for a few weeks, so I’ll probably have to get new ones.

By the way, what does warming up the milk do? I’ve never read about doing that before. I just used cold milk and popped the jar into my cabinet for 24 to 48 hours, then drained and repeated. Does warming the milk make the kefir thicker?

By: IJecsMommy

IJecsMommy — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 11:39:00 +0000

I’ve seen Kefir in our natural foods market and always wondered what it was and what it tastes like. My kids have asked multiple times if they could try it, and I was always nervous about it. I think I’ll buy some today and we’ll try it!