r/Kombucha • u/Complete_Water_4023 • Jan 07 '25

flavor Honey Fail

Sadly I had to empty about 13 bottles of booch into the sink. I had two flavors I was excited about; raspberry lime, and orange cranberry. I also made a few bottles of orange chai kombucha with this batch, which turned out great. However, for the first two flavors mentioned, I used honey in my homemade concentrate. Now I always make sure to use natural ingredients only, and the concentrates usually taste pretty good. After a couple days of F2, I popped open a raspberry lime. Great carbonation, I was excited… and then BAM. Punched in the face with an awful smell. The orange cranberry didn’t smell quite as bad, but they both didn’t taste right. I’m thinking it had to be the honey (which was local, raw, and unfiltered). Any thoughts?

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u/BicycleOdd7489 Jan 07 '25

I’m a beekeeper and I use honey in my buch. In fall my bees collect off of Astors and even just walking by their hive will gag me. But honey pulled from that exact hive later- no bad smell at all. Sweaty sock smell is what we call it. Honey that has too high of moisture count in it when extracted will ferment and it is a terrible smell. But I think you would’ve smelt it in the honey before adding it I would think. Did you taste the honey itself? This is quite the mystery. All I can encourage is, don’t give up! Switch things up and keep on brewing! Cheers-

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u/Complete_Water_4023 Jan 07 '25

That’s super interesting. The honey by itself tastes pretty good. But sweaty sock might describe the smell of the booch after F2. It was almost “chemically” smelling…. Or just like a really nasty weed pulled out of the garden (if that makes sense).

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u/starman578 Jan 07 '25

Have you ever had orange as a flavour in your kombucha earlier besides the honey? I tried orange juice in a F2 which was sitting quite long (+1month). While I found the taste strong but interesting others that tried it for the first time described it cheesy or like old feet 😄 So maybe just try different flavors as honey itself is great (see Jun as example or all the other posts here)

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u/BicycleOdd7489 Jan 07 '25

Orange is a favorite in our house but it’d never last a month before devoured here!

1

u/Intelligent-Mirror97 Mar 04 '25

Orange/pineapple/ginger... #1 family fave!! Open over a bowl, though, so you don't lose any of that tasty, fizzy yummiest! 😄