The good, the bad and the bacteria

The jury’s still out on kombucha tea; it’s either the drink of the gods or a juicy mold bacteria that will kill the world, one yoga enthusiast at a time. Those who swear by the odd-tasting liquid are almost fanatical in their dedication to the beverage, which is, depending on whom you ask, at best healthy and delicious, and at worst going to kill you.

Kombucha, for the uninitiated, is a delightful little tea said to have originated in China centuries ago. It’s made by leaving a fungus of yeast and bacteria to ferment in sugary tea at room temperature for one to two weeks. The result is a bold, carbonated, vinegary beverage that for many is an acquired taste.

And while there aren’t enough medical studies to know for certain what the long-term effects of drinking kombucha might be, one thing is certain: Many are obsessed with this strange drink.

Kombucha lovers are fanatical, like Jehovah’s Witnesses—one gulp away from knocking on your door in the morning and preaching the good word.

Take, for instance, Zachary Nelson, an artist and musician who gets a glint in his eye when the subject comes up in casual conversation. Nelson loves kombucha so much that he and a friend, Bobby Mull, decided to turn their home-brewing hobby into a business, named Borrelend (Dutch for “bubbling”), currently still in the testing phase. Using Mull’s kitchen as a laboratory, the two are working to perfect different recipes—with varying results. For example, the hops flavor was a hit for the partners (“Skunky, bright and refreshing,” says Nelson), while the tomato-garlic turned out to be a putrid mess. Part of the fun of brewing kombucha, it seems, is the trial and error. Whatever the outcome, the purpose remains the same.

“I think there’s a reason people drink it,” Nelson says. “When I drink it, I feel great.”

Mull agrees.

“It is probiotic, and it’s antiseptic,” he says. “But I don’t think there’s been enough research on it.”

To be sure, the drink’s health benefits are, so far, at least, largely anecdotal. Kombucha has been said to, among other things, clean the liver, increase blood flow, repair the digestive tract and increase serotonin levels.

But until there’s science behind such claims, they should be treated as bogus, says Sarah Baracco, a dietitian with Kaiser Permanente in Roseville.

“It’s not necessarily something that’s true or proven,” she says, adding that the whole method of kombucha brewing—fermenting tea—is sketchy at best when it comes to health considerations.

If you’re not careful, the exposed crock pots and live cultures are a recipe for sickness, Baracco says. “There’s lots of potential risk with those types of things—food-borne illness and cross contamination and all of that stuff.”

And, if it’s probiotics you’re after, Baracco says, there are other foods such as yogurt, sauerkraut, kefir and pickles that contain “good bacteria” that aids the digestion process.

But we live in America, where the dietitian’s voice goes largely ignored. Despite warnings from the medical community, kombucha is steadily creeping toward the mainstream.

In Sacramento, it’s available at stores such as Nugget Market, Whole Foods Market and the Sacramento Natural Foods Co-op, as well as in various restaurants. Local brewer Zachary Pasillas, for example, distributes his Zack’s Kombucha drink to The Green Boheme, Midtown Village Cafe and The Plum Cafe.

And don’t tell Baracco, but pretty soon, the world’s first kombucha truck will cruise Sacramento streets dispensing the beverage. The truck, Kombucha Kulture, is the brainchild of Joey Melrose and Brianne Giatras, a Sacramento couple who have spent most of their free time modifying an antique 1950s trailer they hope to have rolling through Sacramento by mid-July. The plan: drive their ride around to health festivals, weddings, special events and food-truck meet ups to dispense kombucha on tap from well-known companies such as Revive, Kombucha Botanica, House Kombucha, Clearly Kombucha and Zack’s Kombucha.

“We’re trying to keep everything as local as possible,” Melrose says.

Melrose, who works in the construction business, is a full-fledged kombucha fiend who says he came across the brew while researching ways to quit drinking alcohol and quickly fell in love with its claimed probiotic benefits. He then introduced it to Giatras. The two were so fascinated by the product, touting its health benefits, that they decided to become a part of the kombucha community.

To start, Melrose and Giatras ran a little test in Sacramento to feel out the market, setting up a tasting station on a Midtown corner during Second Saturday.

The reaction from passersby surprised the couple.

“They loved it,” Giatras says. “I thought we were going to be fighting for people to come see us, but we had people coming back … and back.”

Perhaps once Nelson and Mull have finessed their recipes, their Borrelend brew will spew freely from the Kombucha Kulture draft. Until then, however, Mull’s house continues to double as a testing ground where crocks covered by cloth take up space in the vinegary-smelling kitchen. Dark-brown bottles with their contents scrawled on tape compete with food for space in the refrigerator.

In his living room, Mull pours a couple ounces of a mandarin-and-pu-erh-tea blend into a small glass; the drink is strong—fizzy and vinegary with a bold orange flavor. Other brews taste lightly carbonated, while others make you burp instantaneously. Some taste strongly of alcohol—of which kombucha contains trace amounts because of the way it ferments. When kombucha is bottled, the fermentation process continues, making it difficult to gauge exactly how much alcohol and carbonation have been produced—hurdles that can sometimes make it difficult to sell the product commercially.

As the night wears on, Nelson talks about his unusual love for kombucha that reaches even beyond the bottle; he began using every part of the waste, making sculptures with the dried up, leathery leftovers (“biofilm”), which he crafts into gigantic zombielike animals and apocalyptic landscapes as if they were hunks of clay.

Nelson talks a good game, but then someone urges him to prove his dedication by taking a bite of the gelatinous “mother” blob floating on top of the kombucha liquid. With little prodding, he tears off a hunk of the Frisbee-shaped substance, which flops around like a jellyfish in between his fingers, looks at it questioningly and chomps down.

The verdict?

“I don’t like it,” he says, squinting his eyes, chewing loudly as he makes a funny face that conveys either complete disgust or unbridled love.

“It’s like sour-vinegar spaghetti … slash sashimi,” he says.

So while the jury’s out, you might as well try a bottle and see what you think. The tastes are as varied: Revive tastes like light beer with a bit of vanilla; GT’s Raspberry Chia is sour and thick with slimy little seeds, while the Rejuvenation Company’s Original tastes like slightly spoiled apple juice.

Here’s a hint: The initial sip is always weird, like the first time you try beer—a bit jolting and unpleasant—but before you know it, you might be buying in bulk, doing keg stands and running wild in the streets, singing the praise of this strange, strange brew.