Kefir : These a some of my plump & happy... - Healthy Eating

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Kefir

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These a some of my plump & happy kefir grains before going to swim, grow fatter, & reproduce in a new bath of milk. The biggest grains are 15-20mm in size, so will soon need separating in to smaller 5mm grains. The one on the spoon is about the volume of tiny 10g of grains that the rest have grown from to over 700g. I maintain 2-3 batches of 300-400g in rotation in & out of the fridge to prevent them fermenting too quickly. At an ambient temperature 50g of smaller grains, which have a greater surface area, would be enough to ferment 1l of organic whole milk. The softer inside of each grain is protected by a tougher outer layer. When the grains are split. the kefir changes in taste & consistency as different strains of bacteria, yeast & streptococci are exposed to their food source.

More links to follow: chriskresser.com/kefir-the-...

Chris Kresser has an excellent & free e-book on gut health for anyone signing up to his functional medicine email. Please see excerpt below. I've found this information & other free e-books to be a very useful healthy eating & nutrition resource.

I'll add to this as I come across more articles:

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl... This paper includes photographs of some of the individual lactobacillus, yeast, & streptococci. :)

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/252...

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/242...

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/213...

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/233...

theguardian.com/lifeandstyl...

NB Water kefir is beneficial for anyone choosing a solely plant based diet, & those with dairy intolerance beyond lactose:

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/285...

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/271...

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Chris Kresser: Gut Health excerpt

All disease begins in the gut. – Hippocrates

Hippocrates said this more than 2,000 years ago, but we’re only now coming to

understand just how right he was. Research over the past two decades has revealed that

gut health is critical to overall health, and that an unhealthy gut contributes to a wide

range of diseases including diabetes, obesity, rheumatoid arthritis, autism spectrum

disorder, depression and chronic fatigue syndrome.

In fact, many researchers (including myself) believe that supporting intestinal health and

restoring the integrity of the gut barrier will be one of the most important goals of

medicine in the 21st century.

There are two closely related variables that determine our gut health: the intestinal

microbiota, or “gut flora”, and the gut barrier. Let’s discuss each of them in turn.

THE GUT FLORA: A HEALTHY GARDEN NEEDS HEALTHY SOIL

Our gut is home to approximately

100,000,000,000,000 (100 trillion) microorganisms.

That’s such a big number our human brains can’t really comprehend it. One trillion dollar

bills laid end-to-end would stretch from the earth to the sun – and back – with a lot of

miles to spare. Do that 100 times and you start to get at least a vague idea of how much

100 trillion is.

The human gut contains 10 times more bacteria than all the human cells in the entire

body, with over 400 known diverse bacterial species. In fact, you could say that

we’re more bacterial than we are human.

Think about that one for a minute.

We’ve only recently begun to understand the extent of the gut flora’s role in human

health and disease. Among other things, the gut flora promotes normal gastrointestinal

function, provides protection from infection, regulates metabolism and comprises more

than 75% of our immune system. Dysregulated gut flora has been linked to diseases

ranging from autism and depression to autoimmune conditions like Hashimoto’s,

inflammatory bowel disease and type 1 diabetes

Unfortunately, several features of the modern lifestyle directly contribute to unhealthy gut

flora:

Antibiotics and other medications like birth control and NSAIDs

Diets high in refined carbohydrates, sugar and processed foods

Diets low in fermentable fibers

Dietary toxins like wheat and industrial seed oils that cause leaky gut

Chronic stress

Chronic infections

Antibiotics are particularly harmful to the gut flora. Recent studies have shown that

antibiotic use causes a profound and rapid loss of diversity and a shift in the composition of the gut flora. This diversity is not recovered after antibiotic use without intervention.

We also know that infants that aren’t breast-fed and are born to mothers with bad gut

flora are more likely to develop unhealthy gut bacteria, and that these early differences in gut flora may predict overweight, diabetes, eczema/psoriasis, depression and other health problems in the future...

...To review, here are my top tips for improving your overall gut health:

Remove all food toxins from your diet

Maximize your digestive capacity using supplemental acid and enzymes

Eat plenty of fermentable fibers (starches like sweet potato, yam, yucca, etc.)

Eat fermented foods like kefir, yogurt, sauerkraut, kimchi, etc., and/or take a high-

quality, multi-species probiotic*

Treat any intestinal pathogens (such as parasites) that may be present

Take steps to manage your stress

Full e-book available from CK's website, as well as several shorter articles re good, bad diets, & what to always avoid which I've posted, previously. CK's pro-paleo, which doesn't suit my food preference as a vegetarian, however, the information he provides is easy to read, & easy to understand & follow.

Other books include Michael Mosley's* Clever Gut's Diet & Giulia Enders' Gut: the inside story of our body’s most under-rated organ.

*MM found kefir to be the best source of probiotic to be able to survive digestion & reach the gut. bbc.co.uk/programmes/articl...

Can I alter my gut bacteria and improve my health?

More and more research is suggesting that our gut bacteria can influence almost every aspect of our health, from balancing our blood glucose to affecting our mood. So is there anything we can do to change this inner ecosystem for the better?

Popular probiotic products available readily in supermarkets, pharmacies and health food shops claim that there is. Unlike antibiotics, which kill harmful bacteria, probiotics are supposed to work by enhancing the quality and quantity of so called “friendly bacteria” in our guts.

Already in the UK we spend over £700 million a year on these products, but doubts still remain over how well they actually work. Can the microbes in them survive the perilous journey through the strong acid in our stomachs, which is designed to kill off dangerous bacteria in our food? And if they do survive to reach our intestines, can they compete with the families of bacteria already living there and set up home, populate and multiply?...

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

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BadHare

Yemoos lists these as components of kefir grains. Each strain will have several from each microbiological family, dependent on geography & the substrate used for cultivation.

Strains of bacteria and yeast found in Kefir Grains (and kefir itself):

The following strains are grouped by type, and are the result of years of research from Dominic Anfiteatro, a leading researcher in kefir. We have not personally verified the list.

LACTOBACILLI

Lactobacillus acidophilus

Lb. brevis [Possibly now Lb. kefiri]

Lb. casei subsp. casei

Lb. casei subsp. rhamnosus

Lb. paracasei subsp. paracasei

Lb. fermentum

Lb. cellobiosus

Lb. delbrueckii subsp. bulgaricus

Lb. delbrueckii subsp. lactis

Lb. fructivorans

Lb. helveticus subsp. lactis

Lb. hilgardii

Lb. helveticus

Lb. kefiri

Lb. kefiranofaciens subsp. kefirgranum

Lb. kefiranofaciens subsp. kefiranofaciens

Lb. parakefiri

Lb. plantarum

STREPTOCOCCI/LACTOCOCCI

Streptococcus thermophilus

St. paracitrovorus ^

Lactococcus lactis subsp. lactis

Lc. lactis subsp. lactis biovar. diacetylactis

Lc. lactis subsp. cremoris

Enterococcus durans

Leuconostoc mesenteroides subsp. cremoris

Leuc. mesenteroides subsp. mesenteroides

Leuc. dextranicum ^

YEASTS

Dekkera anomala t/ Brettanomyces anomalus a

Kluyveromyces marxianus t/ Candida kefyr a#

Pichia fermentans t/ C. firmetaria a

Yarrowia lipolytica t/ C. lipolytica a

Debaryomyces hansenii t/ C. famata a#

Deb. [Schwanniomyces] occidentalis

Issatchenkia orientalis t/ C. krusei a

Galactomyces geotrichum t/ Geotrichum candidum a

C. friedrichii

C. rancens

C. tenuis

C. humilis

C. inconspicua

C. maris

Cryptococcus humicolus

Kluyveromyces lactis var. lactis #

Kluyv. bulgaricus

Kluyv. lodderae

Saccharomyces cerevisiae #

Sacc. subsp. torulopsis holmii

Sacc. pastorianus

Sacc. humaticus

Sacc. unisporus

Sacc. exiguus

Sacc. turicensis sp. nov

Torulaspora delbrueckii t

* Zygosaccharomyces rouxii

Legend

t Teleomorph. Sexual reproductive stage. Yeast form pseudo-mycelium as in Flowers of Kefir.

a Anamorph. Asexual reproductive stage. Reproduce by budding or forming spores or cell

splitting [fission].

# Can utilize lactose or lactate.

^ Aroma forming.

subsp. Sub specie type.

sp. Specie type.

sp. nov. New strain or new specie strain type.

biovar. Biological variation strain type.

var. Variety type.

Units Count of Microbes in Gram Stained Kefir Grains

Bacilli [single cells, pair, chains]

Streptococci [pair, chains]

Yeast [single cells]

The Means Range

Bacilli 66, 62-69%

Streptococci 16, 11- 12%

Yeast 18, 16- 20% [11]

Evolution Sequence among Genus Groups during Kefir Culture Cycle

Lactococci > Lactobacilli > Leuconostoc > Yeast > Acetobacter

Microbial Composition of Kefir at End of Fermentation [colony forming units/ml] **

Lactococci : 1,000,000,000

Leuconostocs : 100,000,000

Lactobacilli : 5,000,000

Yeast : 1,000,000

Acetobacter : 100,000

Zest profile image
Zest

Wow, those Kefir grains look very plump and bursting with life!!! Thanks for all that information - I enjoy my daily Kefir very much - I'm still buying mine pre-made from the supermarket, but one day I might dabble in obtaining grains to make my own. You are certainly doing really well with making yours! Very inspiring. :-)

Zest :-)

BadHare profile image
BadHare in reply toZest

Hope you get the fresh ones soon, it's fabulous stuff! :)

Mx

Hi BadHare, I agree your kefir looks amazing. This is also packed with info so theres a lot of interesting reading here so thanks for doing the research for us.

Our gut villi increases the absorbent area in our small intestines to that of approx a football pitch (4500 sq meters) So as you rightly say our gut flora is very important.

Its also interesting quoting Hippocrates and of course he was right. Have you come across Jethro Kloss? he wrote the back to eden books and he said in the 1920's that in the future hospitals would be full of people because of their diets and boy was he right. He was a seventh day adventist and would quote the bible to people and said that baking powder was the work of the devil (because its Epsom salts) Anyway I'm drifting off at a tangent here LOL.

And this is what you want to make sourdough bread with and the kefir looks so good to me I think it will work out fine.

BadHare profile image
BadHare in reply to

Thanks Jerry! I've been meaning to make a resource post for ages, as I keep using these links at random & have to look them up every time. There are several missing, even one research paper stating it's as good as mouthwash.

Eating well isn't new. I think some of the Greek philosophers were even vegetarian.

I've not heard of Jethro Kloss, but agree he's right to a point. Diets were always nutritionally deficient for poor people, & in excess for the rich. I really don't agree with him on epsom salts? Can you explain his reason? I like soaking in a bath with a whole kilo in.

There are a lot of yeast in the kefir matrix, so it should knock a few days off the sourdough fermentation process. I like to use rye & 00 flour for baking, though neither are GF. The slower fermentation is supposed to break down gliadin & fructans rendering the bread healthier, but I doubt that's sufficient for coeliacs.

Mel

Thank you Mel for providing very interesting reading and links and also your Kefir grains look amazing. That'll be me in the kitchen when I purchase mine.

Alicia :)

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BadHare in reply to

You're welcome Alicia!

I'll add more papers as I find them. :)

Mel

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Zest

Hi Mel,

Just checking if I can reply to your post, as you mentioned the 'reply function' was turned off.

Seeing if it works, as I can't see that...

Zest :-)

BadHare profile image
BadHare in reply toZest

It's miraculously back on again! ;)

Zest profile image
Zest in reply toBadHare

lol I wonder what has happened...?

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