hist-brewing: Kumiss

[-Tevildo.]

In response to the kumiss thread...

I've made Kumiss (koumis, whichever way ya like it) only once. The recipe I 
used called for a gallon of skim milk, boiled, sweetened with a small amount 
of brown sugar, and fermented with baker's yeast for a short period, 
followed by refrigeration. It was an informative experience. This is the 
advice I can provide: Do not use goat's milk. It isn't any closer to horse 
milk, and it tastes like garbage only more harsh. No yeast, neither brewing 
nor baking nor wild yeast, can digest lactose, so don't bother adding any. 
As far as fermentable sugars go, all the recipes I've seen seem to call for 
too little. I would stay away from honey, since it tends to slow down 
fermentations. Light brown sugar is probably best. How much you initially 
add is completely up to you (I found myself adding it directly to the glass 
for flavor reasons--a half cup or slightly less per gallon seems about right 
for me). I have not tried using lactobacilli, lactase, or yoghurt cultures, 
but I would be willing to try the yoghurt. There is another milky-type drink 
called kefir (quickly becoming a health fad, jump aboard if you'd like), 
which contains tamed cultures that may be just what we're looking for to 
merge the milk aspect with the fermentation. I'm also considering cultured 
buttermilk. Of course, none of these ideas are period (except maybe the 
cultures) but I'm looking for what works for me now. If somebody thought it 
worthwhile to look into and compare the various microbes at work here...? 
It's a bit beyond my scope.          -Tevildo.

Is there any worse game than this? 
http://ural2.hszk.bme.hu/~s5134gef/paprika/paprika.html
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from this list, send email to majordomo at pbm.com containing
the words "unsubscribe hist-brewing" (or unsubscribe hist-brewing-digest, if
you get the digest.) To contact a human about problems, send mail to
owner-hist-brewing at pbm.com