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orange rosemary rosehip kombucha

Orange Rosemary Rosehip Kombucha

Rosemary isn’t just for potatoes and Thanksgiving anymore! Give this recipe a try to meet a new side of comforting, herbaceous rosemary.

Fresh herbs impart a fresh familiarity to kombucha that you can’t quite pinpoint. It is like a delicious mystery. Rosemary, in this case, rounds out the flavors in a woody, earthy way, which it does through taste and almost equally through aroma. Rosehips are naturally tart and basically anything tart goes well with kombucha. The only thing missing now is something sweet. Enter orange juice. You can use fresh-squeezed orange juice, or any store-bought juice will work just fine ?.

A Beginner's Guide on How to Make Orange Rosemary Rosehip Kombucha

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Primary vs Secondary Fermentation

It’s important to note that brewing homemade kombucha is almost always a two-step fermentation process. Brewing kombucha is only a one-step process for those who prefer an unflavored flat kombucha. Otherwise, the steps consist of a primary fermentation and secondary fermentation.

  1. Primary Fermentation: The primary fermentation is the first step of the kombucha brewing process. This is where your SCOBY transforms regular sweet tea into the tart and slightly sweet kombucha we love. At the end of this stage, you will have finished kombucha, but it will be flat and unflavored. Have you skipped this step? Then check out our guide on making kombucha at home or our guide on making jun kombucha at home. Traditional kombucha is going to yield a bolder brew, while jun kombucha is milder and a bit more tart.
  2. Secondary Fermentation: The secondary fermentation is the step where you bottle, carbonate, and flavor your kombucha by the addition of sugar and flavors. This step is essentially adding a bit of sugar/flavor to each airtight bottle and letting it ferment a little longer, allowing the yeast to carbonate the beverage in an airtight environment naturally. How exactly does this happen? See our post on kombucha secondary fermentation here.

Since this recipe is for the secondary fermentation, to make this recipe, you’ll need to have kombucha that has finished the primary fermentation and ready to bottle.

Ingredients

  • Kombucha: You need kombucha that has completed primary fermentation and is ready to bottle and flavor. 
  • Rosehips: Rosehips are the fruit of the rose plant. They bear the seeds and can be eaten raw but are more commonly found dried and used for teas, jams, and rosehip soup.  
  • Rosemary: Fresh rosemary is the only way to go, here. The point of the rosemary is to add fresh aromatics and you just can’t get that with dried rosemary.  
  • Orange Juice: Straight from the carton is best as the juice will be at its peak sweetness. You never know what you’re going to get from a fresh orange and you want the most flavor possible from scant 2 fl oz that you’re adding.  

Secondary Fermentation Preparation

This recipe makes one 16 fluid ounce bottle. For a 1-gallon batch, make 7 16 ounce bottles of kombucha or times the ingredients by 7. Before beginning this recipe, you will want to:

  1. Reserve 12 – 16 fluid ounces of kombucha and your pellicle from your completed primary fermentation and set aside. It’s best to pour from the top of the brew jar as the bottom will have a much higher yeast concentration. You will use this as your starter for your next gallon batch of kombucha.
  2. With your kombucha starter tea and SCOBY placed aside, you will now have enough kombucha left to make seven 16 oz bottles. These bottles are the most popular as they are considered the best bottles for kombucha secondary fermentation, but any other airtight bottles made for carbonation will work.  

How to Make Orange Rosemary Rosehip Kombucha

This recipe is super simple. We’ll have you enjoying your own orange rosemary rosehip kombucha in no time. Let’s dive in:

  1. Prepare: Boil water then add rosemary and rose hips. Turn off heat and steep until completely cool. Remove rose hips and rosemary from your pot.
  2. Bottle: Add orange juice and the rosemary-rosehips tea to your bottles. Top each bottle with kombucha, be sure to leave 1 to 2 inches of headspace at the top.
  3. Ferment: Allow your bottles to ferment at room temperature for 2 to 10 days. Burp your bottles as needed until your preferred level of carbonation is achieved. This step is mostly based on temperature; it will go faster at higher temperatures and slower when colder. More on this here, What is burping your kombucha bottles? 
  4. Enjoy: Chill in the refrigerator before serving. Based on preference, you can serve as is or strain before drinking. 

Orange Rosemary Rosehips Kombucha Recipe

Course: Kombucha, Kombucha Recipes, rosemary, rosehips, orange, Rose hipsCuisine: KombuchaDifficulty: Easy
16 fl oz Bottles
Prep time

20

minutes
Second Fermentation

2-10

This Orange Rosemary and Rosehips Kombucha recipe is for 1, 16 fl oz bottle. For a 1-gallon batch, make 7 bottles. To scale this recipe to a 1-gallon batch, multiply the ingredients by 7 or toggle the serving size up to 7 above. Before bottling your kombucha, remove the SCOBY pellicle along with 12-16 fl oz of kombucha starter tea from your brew, and reserve for your next batch.

Ingredients & Supplies

  • Ingredients
  • 16 fl oz Kombucha from a completed primary fermentation.

  • 2 tsp Rosehips

  • 1 Sprig Fresh Rosemary

  • 2 fl oz Water

  • 2 fl oz Orange Juice

  • Supplies
  • Tea steeping vessel – This can be a tea ball, re-usable tea bag, cheese cloth, or a strainer (any way to steep loose leaf tea) 

  • Small pot to boil water

  • Strainer – Optional

Directions

  • Bring water to a boil in a small pot. Remove from heat. 

  • Steep rosehips and rosemary until completely cooled, about 10-15 minutes. 

  • Remove rosehips and rosemary, stir in orange juice and pour the mixture into a clean bottle. For an aesthetically pleasing twist and stronger rosemary flavor, you can add the rosemary sprig into the bottle with the kombucha. 

  • Keep bottles at room temperature for 2-10 days; it will carbonate faster at higher temperatures and slower when cold.

  • Once per day, you’ll want to burp the bottles. This is done by removing the cap to allow built-up pressure to escape then placing the cap back on. As soon as you put the lid back on, the carbonation will begin to build back up, so no worries about it getting flat. Try not to skip this, or you may get kombucha all over your face when you do go to open it or, worse yet, a bottle bomb.

  • Chill in the refrigerator once you’re happy with the carbonation levels. Based on preference, you can serve as is or strain before drinking.

Tips

  • If you don’t have rosehips you can substitute hibiscus flowers or dried cranberries to provide a similar tart element.
  • This kombucha makes a great base for salad dressings. Mix it with olive oil in a 50:50 ratio, add some chopped herbs (fresh or dried), salt u0026amp; pepper, and voila!

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