Kombucha Cultures - where to buy?

[Shoefly]

Does anyone know where to buy the Kombucha culture used to make homemade tea? All I found were websites but not an actual place that I can look at the Kombucha culture before I buy it. Thanks!

[frontzNskrontz]

buy unflavored kombucha. put in large glass container, covered by cheesecloth. you will have a kombucha culture disk form on top within a week.

[anniescamera]

I am also looking to start my own Kombucha at home. I am having trouble finding the culture. any ideas in San Fran? Thank you.
Annie

[Ralphonzo]

There is the kombucha collective in San Francisco and I think they do Oakland and Berkeley.
kombuchakollective.wordpress.com

[e.rivera81]

Oh no! I'm running low!

[Hannabanana]

Hi everyone.
This is way after the original post. But I moved here last year and I had a hard time finding a good mushroom. Finally, I ordered a nice baby kombucha and I am very happy with it and the babies :)
If anyone needs a mushroom, please email me [e-mail] and I can share :)

[lhardy4940]

Hi Hanna, I know this post was super long ago....but I just moved to SF and am trying to find a scoby to restart my home brewing here. Do you still have any (are you still in the bay area!?)?

[e.rivera81]

I am in San Francisco and have so many baby Scobys it's ridiculous, LoL. Let me know if you need any.. email... [e-mail]

[badbatzmaru]

I dont know where to buy the culture...but I do know that after drinking the Kombucha drinks I buy at Whole Foods, I feel a million dollars.

[oaklandfoodie]

The stand that sells the yummy kraut at the Saturday Berkeley Farmers Market also sells kombucha kits (including the baby - I think it's called a baby) for $25. It's called Cultured, I believe and they are near the MLK end of the market.

[wally]

Also at the Tuesday market.

[Robert Lauriston]

Rainbow Grocery.

[Shoefly]

No they don't - they sell the packaged tea, but do not sell the active live culture. Thanks for trying.

[SteveG]

The tea has live cultures. If you introduce oxygen into the bottle, the fermentation goes wild.

[SteveG]

Today at Rainbow, I noticed a second type of kombucha for sale. The individual bottles with added flavor (lemon, fruit juice, etc.) do contain live cultures, but in the health supplements section of the store in a stand-alone fridge, I found a 750 mL bottle of crazy imported German Kombucha containing black tea, sugar, and live cultures. The label indicated it would be cloudy due to the live culture, and claimed various certifications and internal purity checks for their production process.

A helpful fellow shopper of the type you could only meet at Rainbow Grocery saw me reading the bottle, and stopped to tell me "you'll like that product. It's sort of the Rolls Royce of Kombuchas." OK then, into the cart it goes...I'll post back if I feel ten years younger by the end of the week.