Live Kefir Company, Live Milk Kefir Grains. UK Starter Culture, Complete with Instructions. 5g

I’m so glad I decided to try these kefir granules. They arrived fresh, well-packaged, and started producing kefir within a couple of days. At first, I wasn’t sure if I was looking after them correctly, but after a few batches they really settled in and now give me delicious, creamy kefir every day.The taste is slightly tangy and refreshing — much better than shop-bought kefir, and I love knowing it’s full of probiotics and completely natural. I’ve even started experimenting with second ferments using fruit, and the flavour options are endless.The instructions provided were clear and easy to follow, and the granules seem very resilient. It’s a little bit of a daily commitment (straining and refreshing the milk), but the process quickly becomes part of the routine.If you’re interested in gut health or just want a healthy, homemade alternative to yoghurt and probiotic drinks, I highly recommend these kefir granules. They’re excellent quality and will keep producing as long as you look after them.

Great product, the kefir was really tasty and the instructions easy to follow.

Kefir is all the rage these days and I am seeing both plain and flavoured versions appearing in supermarket chill cabinets. I tried these and liked them before realising that it was much cheaper to get my hit from Eastern European grocers. There is one round the corner from where I live and most UK towns of any size now have them. 99p a litre for Polish kefir sure beats £1.70 for a tiny bottle in Sainsburys!As my taste for a daily dose increased I set out to make my own at home though, and I have found it really easy with this product. Can't recommend it enough. What you get is a small quantiy of kefir grains in a ziplock bag, together with good clear instructions. You start off making just a small cup of kefir a day but your grains soon grow and you can use them to culture larger and larger quantities of milk. The instructions profided with these grains include a chart of grain weight to milk volume, but I have found that I soon got my eye in for increasing the volume as the grains grew. You get a feel for how creamy you want the kefir to be.In a couple of weeks you go from producing a small wine-glass of kefir daily, to over a pint.The important thing is the culture does not like metal so you need glass containers to ferment and store your kefir, and a plastic seive to strain out the grains between ferments. You need to be scrupulous with hygiene but other than that it is all very easy.High in nutrients and probiotics, kefir it is very beneficial for digestion and gut health. Many people consider it to be healthier than yogurt. Yogurt is the best known probiotic food in the Western diet, but kefir is actually a much more potent source.Kefir is originally from the mountainous region that divides Asia and Europe. Grains contain up to 61 strains of bacteria and yeasts, making them a very rich and diverse probiotic sourceKefir grains are not actually grains at all but are small gelatinous beads containing a variety of bacteria and yeasts. The grains are placed in a glass jar/bowl, soaked in milk, covered and left at room temperature for a minimum of 24 hours. This enables the bacteria and yeast to ferment the lactose (natural sugar in milk) into lactic acid, activating the bacteria to proliferate and grow.After around 24 hours at room temperature, the grains are strained from the kefir and transferred to a fresh batch of milk and used again to enable them to keep reproducing - this cycle can be carried on indefinitely. The strained kefir is now ready to drink but benefits from some time in the fridge to chill.The grains will multiply as long as they are kept in fresh milk at the right temperature. When the product is put in the fridge the cool temperature inhibits the fermentation process so you can take a break if the quantity is overwhelming you or you are away from home.Found this product just the thing for getting my home kefir supply up and running. Highly recommend them.

I have tried a few kinds of live kefir grains and these are my favourite so far. They make very nice kefir and they keep going. I’m happy knowing that they’re benefiting my microbiome.It’s worth persevering and tweaking what you do if you’re not used to growing kefir.

My grains (5G) arrived, well packaged, in a ziplock bag inside a jiffy bag. They were quite late (a week in the post) but I think this was down to Royal Mail distribution problems.When I opened them they smelled strongly of yeast with a hint of alcohol, not quite what I was expecting but they'd had a week in the post and kefir contains yeast. I immediately followed the provided instructions and it did work a bit, but the result tasted overly yeasty. I kept at it, and after the 3rd batch, I went rogue and fermented double (around 200ml) of milk for twice as long (48 hours). This massively reduced the yeasty taste and I got a taste much closer to what I was expecting.After a week of making it I can now ferment 240ml in 24 hours, mostly because of the unseasonably warm September we're having and the result is thick, creamy, and tastes as I would expect.My method at the moment:Jersey Milk - 240ml1bsp of grains1tbsp of the previous batch of kefirMix these together in a jar and put some muslin and a band over the topFerment until the curds and whey 'just' start to split. This might take anywhere from 24 to 48 hours depending on the temp of your house.Mix the curds and whey back up so everything is creamyStrain out the grains and make your next batchPut the batch you just made in a sealed container for 24 hours in the fridgeDrink and enjoy!