It’s easy to read a long post and feel overwhelmed. Please don’t do that with milk kefir. How to actually make milk kefir is VERY simple. Milk kefir is made with little colonies of beneficial bacteria and yeasts. They look like pieces of cauliflower. They consume the lactose in the milk and in turn, infuse it with probiotic goodness. These colonies also make the vitamins in the milk more bioavailable.

Milk kefir tastes like a drinkable yogurt and can be consumed as is or in preparations where yogurt would normally be used. The differences between yogurt and kefir, however is vast. Yogurt has around 7 probiotic strains that are all transient, meaning, that they pass through the body quickly. Milk kefir contains over 30+ probiotic strains and some of the strains are not transient; they actually colonize the gut.

Many folks claim that it has alleviated their food allergies, normalized their blood sugar levels and other autoimmune ailments. I discovered milk kefir when I was struggling with one of my babies and myself having thrush. The baby had it in her mouth, all over her tongue and cheeks and I had it in my milk ducts from breastfeeding. It was horribly painful and I had tried what our physician had prescribed and it didn’t work. He eventually ran out of ideas. I tried a dozen or so natural remedies and they gave some relief, but it didn’t fully go away.

I finally decided to try milk kefir and it cleared up totally in days! I was now a believer, but I still knew very little about this almost magical substance. Milk kefir originated in the Caucus Mountains thousands of years ago and different religious backgrounds consider it a gift from God. Scientists are still trying to discover all the properties of milk kefir, how exactly it works, as well as what it is capable of. You can read about it here, here, here. <these are links to scientific studies found on PubMed.

Making Kefir

First, one needs to obtain milk kefir grains. If a friend makes milk kefir, they could share grains with you as they rapidly multiply and need separated off from time to time. Some of the best grains that I’ve owned came from folks making kefir and selling the extras on Etsy (etsy.com). If you receive fresh grains from a friend, you can make edible kefir right away. If they come in the mail, sometimes they need a day or three to fully get back to their normal capabilities. You would simply add new milk, wait 24 hours, strain and repeat up to several times over a period of days.

I personally use raw milk for my kefir as my family doesn’t do well with most pasteurized dairy products. Pasteurized milk is heated to really high temperatures and changes the milk proteins (denatures them) to make them harder to digest and can cause chronic inflammation. I know of many children that stopped getting ear infections once they stopped drinking pasteurized milk. Pasteurized milk, however, can be used to make milk kefir if one is still determined to use it. If you are looking for raw milk, check out a resource list here.

Kefir Grains to Milk Ratio

I’ve seen it stated to use about 1.5T of kefir grains per cup of milk. I personally use about 1.5 T of kefir grains per quart of milk (provided the kefir grains are pretty active). I’ve even used 1.5T of kefir grains in a half gallon of raw milk with excellent results. This may be because my kitchen is warmer due to living in Florida.

Let’s make kefir! 

-Drop your grains on the bottom of a glass jar

-Fill the jar with milk

-Screw on the jar lid loosely

-Leave for 24 hours

You’ll know it’s ready because the liquid will be much thicker and smell much like yogurt.

-Strain the kefir to save your grains

-Put them back in the jar and refill with milk (I personally only wash the jar every 3-4 kefir batches).

(Never, ever heat your kefir grains or put hot milk on them. Also, if they ever need rinsed for any reason, like you dropped some on the floor, rinse with milk, not water.)

Here’s my jar. The kefir grains were dropped into the bottom and fresh milk was added. I waited 24 hours for it to do its thing.

Once the kefir is ready, the grains have to be strained out to save and use for the next batch. Metals other than stainless steel will kill or weaken kefir grains. I like to use a silicone strainer (here). I use a silicone spatula (here) (some people use plastic) to gently stir the kefir in the strainer as it goes into the glass bowl (here) underneath, so the grains are quickly separated. 

Here’s my bowl of delicious kefir. It can be used right away, given a 2nd ferment (will be discussed below) or stored in the fridge for future use. Storing for more than a week will make it more sour. 

2nd fermentation 

At this point the kefir can be stored in the fridge or consumed. Some folks do enjoy doing a 2nd ferment with their kefir. All that is done is a small piece of fruit, citrus peel, or something like garlic (for future savory preparations like a dip) are added to the already made kefir (not the grains) after it’s been stored in a dish or jar with a lid and it’s allowed to sit on the countertop for 12-24 hours. The kefir will consume the natural sugars from the new addition and it will become more effervescent (bubbly) and the B vitamins will be considerably more bioavailable. It will also take some of the tang (sourness) out of the kefir, thus yielding a very mild tasting kefir.

Kefir Grain Storage

What if you need to stop making kefir for awhile? Simply do the steps of placing the kefir grains in a glass jar and fill the jar with milk. Don’t let it sit out for 24 hours. Place it in the fridge instead for up to a week (I’ve gotten away with several weeks). It will make kefir in the fridge very slowly. If the kefir is thickened when you remove it from the fridge, strain as normal. If it is still thin like regular milk, set it out on the countertop for 12-24 hours, till it thickens.

Kefir Separating

If your kefir starts separating into curds and whey, it’s still usable. Do a 2nd ferment to calm down the sourness. If this happens in less than 24 hours, you have too many grains for the amount of milk being used. Remove the excess grains and give to a friend, feed it to chickens, compost them, toss them, whatever. The tiniest grains are the newest grains. The largest ones are the ones I toss when I get too many. I don’t toss all of the large ones if that would leave me with too little grains, but if I’m tossing, it’s the larger ones that begin to get disposed of.