Dried Milk Kefir Grains

[Natalí Stibb]

MilkKefir is a fermented milk beverage, similar to a thin yogurt, that is made from kefir grains- a specific type of symbiotic culture. The kefir grains are added to milk & allowed to ferment. The finished product is great for your gut health, and homemade is much cheaper than store-bought.

Kefir is a breakfast, lunch, and dinner drink popular across Russia, Belarus, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Ukraine - where it is known as an affordable health drink

Note: You will first rehydrate your grains to wake them up, then you can begin making milk kefir.

Pasteurized milk is best for rehydrating grains - once rehydrated, you may introduce raw milk if desired.

Probiotic bacteria found: Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus brevis, Lactobacillus casei, Lactobacillus delbrueckii subsp. bulgaricus, Lactobacillus delbrueckii subsp. delbrueckii, Lactobacillus delbrueckii subsp. lactis, Lactobacillus helveticus, Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens subsp. kefiranofaciens, Lactobacillus kefiri, Lactobacillus paracasei subsp. paracasei, Lactobacillus plantarum, Lactobacillus rhamnosus, Lactobacillus sake, Lactococcus lactis subsp. cremoris, Lactococcus lactis subsp. lactis, Lactococcus lactis, Leuconostoc mesenteroides subsp. cremoris, Leuconostoc mesenteroides subsp. dextranicum, Leuconostoc mesenteroides subsp. mesenteroides, Pseudomonas, Pseudomonas fluorescens, Pseudomonas putida, and Streptococcus thermophilus.

Yeast strains: Candida humilis, Kazachstania unispora, Kazachstania exigua, Kluyveromyces siamensis, Kluyveromyces lactis, Kluyveromyces marxianus, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Saccharomyces martiniae, and Saccharomyces unisporus.

Milk kefir grains are wonderful little critters, that can really get culturing given the right conditions. But what happens if you need to slow down making homemade kefir or even take a break altogether?

Cold temperatures greatly slow the culturing process, so the refrigerator is a good place to store grains when a break is necessary. If your grains are very active and you just want to make less kefir without completely putting your grains on hold, you can find tips for doing this in our tutorial How to Slow Down Milk Kefir + Make Smaller Batches.

When you're ready to make kefir again, you can rehydrate the grains according to the instructions that came with the culture originally or follow the activation instructions for milk kefir grains on our website.

Be prepared...the aroma of drying milk kefir grains is often unpleasant. Unfortunately, there's really no way around it. You can try rinsing them with distilled water prior to drying to minimize the odor. On the bright side, drying grains allows you to use them again in the future to make delicious and probiotic-rich kefir. So, be prepared for a smell, but also safely preserved grains.

If you find yourself not wanting to make kefir on a daily basis, you may also want to consider making kefir with a powdered kefir starter. This starter culture is direct-set, which means each packet of starter is meant to make one batch of kefir.

It is possible to re-culture this a few times before the bacteria weakens if you'd prefer to get more use out of it, but it is a good alternative if you find you don't want to care for kefir grains on a daily basis.

Our Milk Kefir Starter Kit is the best place to jump back into things. This kit includes our Milk Kefir Grains plus 3 tried-and-true culturing supplies to make it easy to get started making milk kefir at home. All you have to do is add the milk!

After your first few batches:

As you continue to make kefir, your grains will grow. At that point, you can either add more milk if you want more kefir, eat them or store them (it's always a good idea to have some back-up grains on hand). They also are a good addition to a compost pile! :)

Eating the grains is another way to get a mega dose of probiotics. Start with a very small amount of balanced, healthy grains and see how your body responds. They taste very pleasant like a sour gummy candy. We love eating them ourselves (as do our dogs and chickens!). You can also blend them in with your kefir or kefir smoothies (throw in some bananas and strawberries for fun!). Everyone is different and some people may be sensitive or not quite use to the sheer number of good bacteria and yeast contained in the grains. As with all things, listen first to your body.

How to store your extra grains:

Freezing - best for medium to long term storage

To freeze, rinse your grains if you wish with water (no chlorine, no heat) and then gently pat them dry with a clean cloth or paper towel. You can take them directly out of a finished batch of kefir and just pat them dry of kefir (they will be more sticky, but rinsing is not absolutely necessary).They will still be damp, now take them and roll them in a bowl of dried milk powder until well coated. Then fill a freezer bag or jar with a generous amount of milk powder and bury them in it (to protect them from air, moisture and freezer burn). You can also try freezing them directly in a milk-filled jar, but it is more damaging, since the water in milk expands as it freezes. If you want to freeze multiple batches of kefir grains in milk, simply place a few grains in each cube of an ice cube tray, fill with milk and let freeze on a flat surface. Then pop them out into a freezer bag within a day or two and store for about 3 months. Dom, a kefir-guru recommends grains spend no longer than six months in the freezer. However, some have had success reconstituting frozen grains after more than 2 years (though we can't say what the quality or health of the grains were at this point!).

If you have a self-defrosting freezer, you can try freeze-drying your grains at home. Try to start with small grains of uniform size (use scissors to make large grains smaller if necessary). Place your grains on a porous, non-metal surface, such as some nylon suspended above a cookie sheet. Allow them to freeze openly in your freezer for about 3-5 days. This will only work in a self-defrosting freezer that is able to wick away moisture as they freeze, allowing them to dry. When they are dry, store them buried in milk powder in the freezer (in a jar or bag) or in a vacuum-sealed bag.

Dehydrating - best for long term, convenient and/or transportable storage

1. Pat your kefir grains dry with a clean cloth or paper towel. You may rinse them ahead of time if you wish In chlorine-free water.

2. Lay out on a clean surface. A cloth or paper towel works well for non-fan drying, a plate, wax paper or any clean surface (non-metal) works fine for forced air drying. Skip to step 5 if you have a fan or dehydrator.

3. If you don't have a fan, cover loosely with paper towel to protect them as they dry, this will take about 2-5 days, depending on room temperature and humidity.

4. Check them as they are drying, flipping them around half-way to expose the damp parts near the bottom.

5. If you have a fan, lay them out as mentioned in step 1 and angle a low or medium force of air towards them (just be careful not to blow them away!). If you have a dehydrator that can do 80F or less, than this is an acceptable method as well. They will dry in about 12-48 hours, depending on room temperature and humidity.

6. You can stop the drying when they appear almost dry but are still barely squishy if you are storing them for a short period of time (such as a week or two). They are slightly more active and fresh in this state. Otherwise proceed to step 7.

7. When the grains are completely dry (hard, small, yellowish) put them into a plastic bag or jar with cotton balls (to absorb excess moisture) and store them at room temperature or in the refrigerator. You can also store them in a paper envelope, inside a jar OR coated in milk powder in a bag or jar. Dehydrated grains can successfully be reconstituted after a year or more.

Refrigerating - best for temporary storage

If you need to store them temporarily, you can always put them in a little fresh milk in the fridge. The colder temperature will slow down the fermentation process for at least several days. This is the best method of storage if you're planning to take a break of about a month or less. It may take a batch or two to fully reactive them. If you're taking a longer break, dehydrating is recommended.

Leigh Tate wrote:

The first is dehydrating milk kefir grains. I washed the grains and spread them out to dry on a cotton kitchen towel for several days until they were hard and dry. Directions say to coat the dried grains with milk powder, which I don't have. So I put them straight into a baggie, and put the baggie in a small paper bag to protect from freezer burn. That went into the freezer until next spring, when I'll have fresh milk again.

Wardee lives in the Boise area of Idaho with her dear family. She's the lead teacher and founder of the Eat God's Way online cooking program as well as the author of Fermenting, Sourdough A to Z, and other traditional cooking books. Eat God's Way helps families get healthier and happier using cooking methods and ingredients from Bible Times like sourdough, culturing, and ancient grains.

You have to change the milk out! Yes the grains ate the lactose slower but when it runs out, they will starve. In fact, my grains make beautifully thick, sweet and creamy kefir in the fridge while the grains on the counter make grainy, sour and separated gunk.

Also depend time volume food-sources & temps Etc each part of the colony is favored. My woman and I favor flavor of our grains at 76 F for 18 hours at constant temp. We also like it in the 54-68 F range for 2-3 or more days Or a fluctuating temp from 68-86 F for between 6-24/36 hours depends on where temp or how it was allowed to fluctuate i.e. Next to pot hot water on counter while making tamales after a cold night and cool day. Each little beneficial good guy in the colony will be producing more or less than the rest of the colony depending food source and Yes Temp.

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