Whole Foods is pulling the fermented tea known as kombucha off its shelves, according to the Associated Press. And it’s not because the yeasty bacterial tendrils swimming about in this beverage, to which some attribute magical properties, make it look like a Snapple that’s been sneezed into all day. No, apparently the fermentation process can produce alcohol, and any beverage that’s more than .5 percent hooch must carry a government warning.
The booze component might help explain some rumored side effects, like lowered anxiety and cure for insomnia, but it doesn’t account for supposed healing effects the drink has on sweaty feet, balding, diarrhea and AIDS. Jury’s still out on that stuff.
This article appears in Los Hechados.
When you imply that those of us who use Kombucha attribute “magical” properties to it, you are simply satirizing our position. Do you attribute “magical” properties to Prozac (other than transforming teenagers into high school shooters) or chemotherapy (besides causing very agonizing deaths)? Despite what the Mayo Clinic wants you to believe, the health benefits of Kombucha have been well documented for more than 60 years. On the other hand, the scant stories of Kombucha drinkers becoming ill are sketchy at best – anecdotal, in fact.
The following website has an excellent list of references spanning several decades which indisputably demonstrate this fact:
http://www.gaiaresearch.co.za/kombucha.html
As for curing AIDS, the jury may still be out on “that stuff”, as you call it. Quite a few people have claimed that Kombucha saved them from their chronic illnesses. Maybe they’re all just making it up – maybe it’s a “conspiracy” of Kombucha drinkers to take money away from huge corporations.
Of course, when someone is cured of cancer or AIDS from Kombucha – or anything else that giant pharmaceutical corporations don’t make money off of – then it’s just “anecdotal evidence”. But when someone supposedly gets sick from Kombucha, then the usual suspects are all over it and include it in their “studies”. Could it be because Pfizer, who is “too big to nail” according to the Feds, isn’t making billions of dollars from Kombucha?
It would be .5% alcohol that requires special labeling (and most importantly taxes), not .05 percent. But I know, math is hard.
I can’t even smell that crap without wanting to gag. It tastes like battery acid mixed with kool-aid and gives me heartburn. I tried to drink it regularly after a friend sad my poor health would turn right around. After two weeks of gagging that poison down I went to the doctor, still feeling bad. The doctor did some scientific tests and we found that I had cancer of the prostate, despite having been on the Magic Tea for two weeks. Or BECAUSE of drinking it for two weeks?? All I know is that chemotherapy and radiation cured my cancer and that nasty “tea” just made me feel worse.
One product that will not be missed.
It’s about time WF acted responsibly on this. We tried to get a kombucha beverage to market a year ago and couldn’t get the alcohol down to .5%, so randomly tested samples off the shelf to see what they ran. All of them where in the 2-3% w/v range, with GT’s being consistently the highest. My hope is a new set of regulations support responsible makers of raw fermented products getting them onto shelves.
Jack H: lighten up, will you?
If “Snapple that’s been sneezed into all day,” doesn’t tickle your funny bone, then perhaps you’re beyond the healing powers of Kombucha.
I believe not all of the kombucha tested by Whole Foods was high in alcohol. Some of the brands were compliant with the 0.5% or less alcohol standard as labeled. Just not all.
Apparently, the more sugars a product contains, often present as a result of added flavorings (fruit juices, etc) rather than as part of the kombucha itself, the more likely that product will be to have a higher alcohol content due to ongoing yeast fermentation in the bottle.
Thanks, Tod. I fixed it. That’ll teach me not to drink and blog.
I jsut rdank sooo much kudojmbacha, aaiND LALL I HVE TO SAY IS ITS CURING MY TUBERPOTATOLOSISSSSSSS BUTTTEvery noewe and theneh= the sherrif comes by and shhuts down my still…,.,.,/.
I absolutely love kombucha – taste and all. Nothing yucky about it at all. And although I am sorry about your cancer, I doubt if two weeks of drinking it would do much either way.
I have definitely reaped health benefits from the last 2 years of drinking it. And although the health benefits have been documented for the last 60 years, it has been brewed and trusted for the last 5000 years. So drink it or not, but realize there are many of us “non crazy” types that trust it, and really enjoy it.
hey sippycup,
Did you really believe that drinking something for two weeks could cure cancer??
commercial kombucha is not a health drink, it’s just better than the colas and other industrial waste oil most americans pour in their sippy cups by the barrel.
Kombucha has no health benefits greater than drinking a glass of water. The idea that dietary glucuronic acid aids the liver in detoxification is unproven, and even it did help, you’d do better getting it from fruit rather than a raw beverage that is easily contaminated by unsanitary fermenting conditions.
Hey, assholes:
http://www.cancer.org/docroot/eto/content/eto_5_3x_kombucha_tea.asp
Quote:
“Serious side effects and occasional deaths have been associated with drinking Kombucha tea.”
I can’t live without the stuff. Love it! And I agree, if the drug companies can’t have a say in things, they make trouble. Natural does work!
I just wanted to say thanks to Jack H for posting a very well thought-out and somewhat enlightening comment.
The fact that people are still leaving comments like “occasional deaths have been associated with” it is evidence as to how influential mainstream medical approaches — which are almost always based on profit instead of…you know…health.
“WOW” — do you go to prescription drug pill websites/articles and spread your wisdom there also?
Why do you people go out of your way to bash something you don’t understand?
oh yah…
“We are told by highly paid experts that we should dismiss the thousands of years of healthful reputation of vinegar and Kombucha. Instead, we should wait until we are sick so we can have the benefit of expensive, patented chemicals, foreign to the body, that are “proven” by “scientific” double-blind studies paid for by benevolent multinational corporations.”
that’s why…
Kombucha has to be consumed w/ food and two one bottle contains 2 servings. Stupid customers were getting it on their lunch breaks and gulping the entire bottle. I just went 2 Wholefood’s competitor and purchased an entire case. One bottle last s me 3 days.
I’m not trying 2 cure anything. I just like it. I bet no one read the label when they bought it. People get upset if they eat or drink something w/o reading label 1st. They grab items because the bottle is prettyor they se a key word* green, ginger, lime etc.)
I’ve tried Kombucha a couple of times and it gave me intestinal cramps. Yogurt is a better source of probiotics. Kombucha IS stronger than the label says (even on a full stomach!) and if I would have found this stuff as a kid, my friends and I would have had a great time getting buzzed. I always buy organic from the hippies and I have to say the majority of the benefits of Kombucha is in these hippies heads. I have seen it before when fasting was the new hippie trend. Religions fast for the head buzz. Hippies think it’s cleansing, but that is what our kidneys are for. I am not religious, but I do think most hippies are naive and searching for some spiritual something and they will take it from anything natural and organic even if it is full of shit, or tastes like it.
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