Deku Buu

A SCOBY from Kombucha would be used to make Kombucha, a fermented drink that uses tea and tastes like a weak vinegar.

Here is the recipe I use to make one gallon of Kombucha:
8 black tea bags
1 cup of sugar
2 cups of finished Kombucha(can be store bought if you do not have Kombucha on hand)
water to make up the rest of the gallon

Steep the tea in some of the water, stir in the sugar and let cool. Once cooled, add the SCOBY and finished Kombucha.

Let sit in a jar with a secured tight weave cloth cover (Kombucha needs to breathe but you don't want fruit flies getting in) for 5-7 days or longer if you prefer a more vinegar-like flavor. You can start taste testing by sneaking a straw in along the SCOBY and draw out some of the liquid. Pull it when you like it and being again. For storage, simply leave the SCOBY with some finished Kombucha until you are ready to use it again.

The acidic content of Kombucha is fairly weak and should not be used as a cleaner but it can be used for a vinegar hair rinse.

If you want to carbonate your Kombucha, you will need to source proper glass/plastic containers rated for pressure (bottles from a homebrew store or Soda Stream bottles). Caution must be taken when carbonating beverages in glass containers, even ones rated for pressure can explode and cause damage.

If you want to do water kefir, you will want to pick up water kefir grains.

Happy brewing!

I rinse my dishes with warm water from the sink to remove any debris then I put them in the dishwasher and do a hot wash when the dishwasher is full. No soap, no detergent just water.

Pretty much the same thing for the laundry, except sometimes I put in a couple of tablespoons of vinegar. Then line dry them in the sun if the weather permits.

I have made evaporated more than once but never condensed. For evaporated milk, I just put the milk in a pot on the stove, turn it on low and leave it for a few hours until it has reduced to half.

My go to "creamer" for coffee and tea is actually just milk, but like the person above me mentioned, if you want real creamer you can just go with real cream. It is pretty decadent especially if you are used to that odd powdered non dairy creamer stuff. Coconut milk also works as a good creamer (super high fat content) if you don't mind a touch of coconut with your coffee and tea.

You can make non-dairy yogurt in much the same way that you would make regular yogurt. You need the "milk", a live yogurt starter (this can be a yogurt culture pack you buy specifically to start your yogurt or you can purchase pre-made yogurt with live bacteria in it). One more thing that I recommend, but that is not necessary, is a thickening agent (gelatin, agar agar) because non-dairy yogurts tend to be thin. Too much gelatin turns will make it more like Jello though, so if that is not your goal, experiment with smaller amounts first! (My kids actually like their yogurt jiggly, so I put extra gelatin in ours.)

I have actually written in length, with tips and pictures about how to make coconut milk yogurt here: Coconut Milk Yogurt. The exact same process can be used to make soy yogurt. You can also see pics of my favorite way to make yogurt, cooler-filled-with-warm-water-and-left-overnight. By far the easiest way I have made yogurt so far.

I would suggest strongly that if your friend uses coconut milk, that the people who are going to consume the yogurt like the flavor of the coconut milk prior to turning it into yogurt. There is nothing like disliking the flavor of the coconut milk then making it into a more sour version of itself. It is not very pleasant to say the least. I would personally use fresh homemade coconut milk as that has the absolute best flavor by far in my opinion. It just takes much more time investment than if you were to just pop open a can or carton of the stuff from the grocery store. But it has the added benefit of not having stabilizers or preservatives added.

By the way, coconut milk beverage is not the same as coconut milk. It is like the difference between buying a jug of cow's milk and buying a carton of chocolate cow's milk. Coconut milk beverage generally has sugar, stabilizers and sometimes flavorings added, which is why it is labeled "coconut milk beverage" instead of just coconut milk.

Here is a link to some interesting findings by the WAPF on soy in general: WAPF Soy Alert.

I have read a ton about making starters, caring for starters, etc. For some reason, when I went to make my own, I completely forgot/disregarded the step where you are supposed to discard/use some of your starter everyday. Instead, I just feed mine everyday (100g water, 100g flour) and when I need it I use it (usually about every 3-4 days). Or when it is threatening to spill over the edges of my 80 ounce jar (I noticed a large pickle jar at my grocery store and knew I would have a use for it, the pickles inside it, however, were not quite as useful as the jar. They actually made one of my sons refuse to eat pickles for a while.). I have not noticed any oddities with it, it makes wonderful breads, cakes, pancakes, waffles, etc and it is always bubbling and active.

Here are two recipes I like to use when my starter begins to get out of hand, you can make double/triple batches to use up the starter then freeze the extras you are not going to use right away. Freeze the crusts with or without toppings, either works.

Sourdough Waffles (Use regular milk if you don't want to use coconut milk)
Sourdough Pizza Crusts (1 big crust or 2 smaller crusts)
241g starter
113g water
1 tsp salt
300g flour

Mix everything in a large bowl and let sit 6-8 hours. Refrigerate dough for 1 or more days. Remove from the refrigerator and let come to room temperature. Sprinkle cornmeal on a pizza tray. Shape the dough on the tray (this is the easiest way to do it, once the starter has been eating at the flour, it doesn't really hold its shape well). Bake at 500° Fahrenheit for 10 minutes. Top with toppings, bake for another 5-7 minutes until your toppings are heated through.


If you are used to making dough with commercial yeast, you may notice a bit of a difference when it comes to using starter instead. First off, those commercial yeasts are called quick rise for a reason, sourdough usually takes a good amount of time, not just to rise the bread but to ferment it. It takes time, but in that time, good things are happening to your flour. Next, the dough is a different consistency. It is generally much wetter and much stickier. The wetter your dough (to a point) the more the dough can rise. If you want large holes in your sourdough bread, you will want a sticky, wet dough that may seem pretty unnatural if you have ever cooked bread using commercial yeast. (Don't add more flour, trust me, it won't come out very good.)

If you want sour sourdough, you want to let the dough rest in the refrigerator. From what I have read, when you refrigerate the dough, the bacteria is able to continue to make the dough sour while you are not in danger of the yeast overproofing the dough. (If the yeast overproofs the dough before you bake, it will fall and leave your bread flat) The longer in the refrigerator the more sour. One day gives it a bit of tang, whereas 3+ days makes the bread noticeably tangy. I made a batch of sourdough english muffins that I left for 4 or 5 days before I was finally able to get around to baking them. Even with butter and jam added to them you could still taste the tang of the sourdough starter. If you do choose to refrigerate, make sure you factor in the time it will take for your dough to come back to room temperature before you can start to use it again (around 2 hours).

I would trade with you but my poor grains are not growing fast enough yet to share. They have only tripled in the last month or so that I have had them, so they are just about to start making 3 cups of water kefir every 2 days. (Unlike my milk kefir grains which have produced so much kefir that I have a back log of 3 gallons in the refrigerator with about 1 pound of excess grains hibernating too, and I am still producing half a gallon of milk kefir a day with the grains out of the refrigerator.)

I bought my grains from "thekefirlady", she sells and ships them priority mail, so depending on where you are in the US you should get it in 1-2 days. It's $15 per culture with $6 shipping. Here is her site : http://kefirlady.com/. Use the contact form to order. She ships them fresh or dehydrated, if you get them fresh then your kefir will start producing good drinkable water kefir more quickly.

A couple of super important things to keep in mind with kefir grains of any kind:

don't use chlorinated tap water

don't use reactive metal or silicone (wood and stainless steel)

if use you distilled water, you need to add extra minerals (an egg shell, black strap molasses)

water kefir likes to be kept at a steady warm temperature, around 70-80° Fahrenheit (this will make them reproduce quicker, otherwise, like mine, they will be slower to multiply)

experiment with extra grains (some acidic fruits, like lemon, cause cause your grains to become mushy)

if you want your water kefir carbonated you will need to tightly seal it in a bottle and let it ferment for longer (take care, there have been incidents of bottle explosions)

water kefir takes a bit longer than milk kefir, usually a minimum of two days, if it is exceptionally warm or cold in your home, it will affect how the grains are fermenting, so keep an eye on them as their temperature changes

The steam cleaners only use water to clean. It heats it up and sprays hot steam out of a nozzle. I really like them because I can use them to mop the floors, clean the counters and clean the windows all without worrying about my children being around weird chemicals. When you have babies crawling on the floor and putting whatever they find into their mouth, it is really nice to know it was only washed with steam.

They work for greasy situations, too. I have effectively used them to clean the grates of my stove top which of course get covered in large amounts of food and grease matter. The only downside is that since they are spraying a highly pressurized jet of steam, the food particles can sometimes get sprayed around the kitchen. Also, depending on the model you have, it takes time to heat the water and sometimes more time to clean up certain things, like grease, because in order for it to be most effective you need to use the smaller spray nozzle. Small price to pay in my opinion for not having to worry about chemicals.

Hello everyone,

I have been off and on using no soap/shampoo in my hair for a few years now (thankfully fully off now for about 3 months) and I have long hair. Off and on because I never had the patience to deal with the in between phase. The one where your hair and scalp are adjusting out of the over production of oil.

I started with just rubbing baking soda through my hair followed by vinegar to detangle after. The vinegar worked great but the baking soda seemed to be doing absolutely nothing. Of course this was after coming off of shampoo which makes you smell like a flower garden and strips your hair of everything. In any case, I gave up and went back to soap/shampoo.

One day I came across someone talking about a cucumber lemon shampoo to degrease. I gave it a try and it worked well. There were a couple of problems though. One, you can't make extra, it will mold in about 2 days. So if I made a large batch I would refrigerate it and of course, about half the time I would start taking a shower while the "shampoo" still sitting in the refrigerator. And two is that there were often large chunks of cucumber leftover in my hair, making it look like I had just gotten into a food fight. So eventually, that was out.

Finally, and I am guessing this is the really big important step I was missing all the times I fell off the no-poo horse, I let my hair adjust. It has taken it probably a good month or more to adjust to not being bombarded by grease striping chemicals but I am now at the point where I do not need to wash my hair with anything but water. I still use baking soda from time to time (about once a month) along with some home-made ACV. My hair now is more manageable than it has ever been in my life.

Some recommendations for the journey to no shampoo:

be patient

keep your hair up (this helps you, and others, not notice how oddly greasy your hair is getting)

be patient

As for the braiding your hair at night, that does work excellently when you can remember to do it, which I often don't. Another one that works for me is to put your hair in a top bun (one on top of your head). It keeps your hair up and is not bothersome like a regular bun would be if you laid down on it, plus its much faster than braiding out two+ feet of hair.

I wish you good luck with your journey!

Our family has pretty much ditched toothpaste altogether, I do keep on hand a tube of Tom's of Maine toothpaste for when we want something minty to brush with (not very often but we both grew up on this stuff so sometimes we don't feel clean without it), but the kids don't use toothpaste anymore. Most often, if we use toothbrushes at all, we just dip it in some baking soda (make sure to buy some that is aluminum free) to brush with. It takes a little getting used to at first, baking soda is salty tasting but in the end we feel it works better and doesn't contain a bunch of stuff we don't want on or in our bodies. It also rinses a million times cleaner. I used to rinse over and over when using regular toothpaste and I never felt that it was getting out of my mouth. 1-2 swishes with water after baking soda and it feels clean.

Another alternative is to ditch the toothbrush altogether and use teeth cleaning sticks. We have used miswaks for a couple of years now and the clean that it provides is way better than any toothbrush I have ever used. Again, something to get used to, it has a taste and odor quite unlike anything I have tasted/smelled before.

Here is the wiki on it if you want to read further : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miswak

You can purchase them on amazon for $3 each (S&H included) or around $1 each from Ebay (S&H included). The brand "Sewak-al-fallah" is supposed to be one of the best brands to buy. I hope this helps and if you have any questions about the baking soda or the Miswaks I am happy to answer them!

Hello I don't know if you got the deodorant issue sorted yet so I thought I would throw in my experiences with going deodorant free. Our family pretty much uses nothing from the store in terms of soap and lotions but that is not necessarily relevant here.

My husband is also sensitive to baking soda, if he uses just baking soda and coconut oil it usually will result in a red rash within a couple of days of use. It works great for deodorizing but obviously this was not going to be a good solution for him to break out in a rash just to use deodorant.

I came across a couple of other recipes and found one that works for us, 6 tablespoons coconut oil, quarter cup baking soda and a quarter cup cornstarch (or arrow root powder, possibly potato starch would work too, I have only used cornstarch since it works well for us). This worked great for a while, he didn't get rashes until one day I used a different baking soda and then the rashes came back again. I found that the regular baking soda from the boxes causes rashes. The one baking soda that works for us is Bob's Red Mill. I think it works best because it is such a fine texture compared to any other baking soda we have tried to use. I don't know what your sensitivity to baking soda is but hopefully this helps.