How to make kombucha without sugar?

First off, there is sugar in the kombucha recipe, but it’s not primarily there for you to eat. To get the SCOBY to do its thing, a batch of kombucha has to involve adding some sugar. You can’t expect the bacteria and yeasts to grow if you don’t feed them, and sugar is what they like to eat. There’s just no way to make sugar-free kombucha. read more

However, the sugar in Kombucha is for the culture to consume, not for you. When done fermenting, there will be about 2-6 grams per 8 ounce glass of unflavored Kombucha. By contrast, an 8 ounce glass of orange juice has about 24g of sugar. read more

The standard Kombucha recipe is 1 cup of sugar per gallon. Too little and you are inhibiting the brew’s normal healthy development; no SCOBY, no acetic acid. Too much and the yeasts will either a) “flush” and overrun the bacteria, or b) fall completely asleep and do nothing. read more

They feed off the sugar and caffeine in the fermenting process, and you’re left with a slightly sweet and super healthy beverage. A lot of homemade Kombucha recipes call for a load of sugar, defeating the health benefits. This one doesn’t. The sugar used is necessary for the SCOBY to eat up (again, science) and you’re left with about 1% sugar. read more