Pride goeth before a fall. I wrote a nice, long post about how amazing my kefir was and then guess what I did. Well, I was trying to do a double ferment on a batch of kefir, so I had 1 quart jar full of the first ferment and 1 quart jar full of the second ferment. When I got up in the morning, one of the jars had completely separated into curds and whey and the other one was just slightly separated. I stirred both jars to recombine the milk, but the kefir in one of the jars seemed really thin. I’ve noticed that when I put the grains in the fridge (so I can take a break from fermenting), the first batch that comes from those refrigerated grains does not have the normal thick consistency, and the kefir is not very tangy.
So I decided to toss what I thought was the second ferment. As I poured it into our very unsanitary kitchen sink, my heart sank when I saw I just dumped out the first ferment – grains and all. My beautiful kefir grains were just laying there in the bottom of the sink.
I kind of view the kefir grains as living beings, so I always try to treat them gently and kindly. Not only was I upset that I just ended my ability to make kefir, but I felt really sad that I just killed the grains. What did they ever do to me except make delicious, healthy kefir???
To salvage what I could, I scooped the grains out of the sink and added them to our compost bin. At least our compost will get a healthy dose of probiotics. The worms will probably love it.
I ordered another batch of grains from Amazon, and they should arrive today. I will be more careful with this set! $6.99 down the drain – literally. Boo!!!