You have the recipes, the cookbooks, and you are ready to get started on your kombucha. What you may not have is a kit or the right supplies for the job. Here are a few supplies you need, beyond the food supplies, that will help you make your kombucha. These are items you can find at most general grocery stores or catering supply stores as well. There is also information on each supply on the list and why you need to choose these particular types of supplies.
SCOBY
SCOBY is the main ingredient for kombucha and though it is technically a food, it is something that you might want to consider a supply instead. You can buy this yeast based supply online and in some respects that may give you an advantage if you are a beginner and want a solid SCOBY for your kombucha mixes. This also takes the guesswork out of what you are doing during the fermentation process as well.
Strip Thermometer
Your temperature, when it comes to kombucha is vital at all stages of the process. You can use a regular food or candy thermometer for this, but ideally you should have some strip thermometers. These can be affixed to the side of the jar and you can check the temperature just with a glance. Nothing has to go into the kombucha and disturb it and you can move the jar if you need to do. You can buy the strips at a supply store in multi packs as well for multiple jars of kombucha.
Muslin Tea Bags
You don’t want to add anything to your kombucha that doesn’t need to be there. When you use regular bagged tea, the tea bags themselves could be adding something, like chemicals, to the mix. You can instead buy muslin tea bags and use those for loose leaf black tea. These are also great if you are adding whole fruits that you may want to strain later. Muslin tea bags can be purchased at most health food stores or whole food stores. You can also make them fairly easily as well. Keep in mind you want an unbleached muslin as well. The bleached bags may leech chemicals into your drink.
If you are just starting out, your best bet would be to get a small kombucha kit. The kit will have everything you need, an instruction book, and will help you move through the process easily. After that, you can move on to getting your own supplies.