Stuff We make
KOMBUCHA
Kombucha, at its most essential, is a sweet tea that has been fermented by a particular culture of bacteria and yeast. The result, when well executed, is a lightly effervescent, mildly acidic beverage containing live probiotic culture and trace amounts of alcohol (<.5% by law). By focusing on the quality and type of tea used, and tweaking, among others, the variables of time and temperature, quite a wide range of flavors of “unflavored” kombucha can be produced. While the choice of tea (and yerba maté) for our base kombucha was deliberate, it was also primarily designed to set up secondary fermentation. Experiments with growing tea and maté in high tunnel greenhouses are ongoing, but the true focus is on imbuing this “base” (unflavored) kombucha with the herbs and fruit that grow well here in southeastern Pennsylvania. Portch Tea produces dozens (and dozens) of different flavor combinations from what the farm grows in a given season.