Six months ago I wrote a post wondering how long my access to commercially produced kombucha would last. Now I have the answer: six months.
This morning, I went to a local Whole Foods looking to replenish my supply of GT’s multigreen kombucha. (In light of Whole Foods’ recent ban of raw milk, I mainly shop there for a few essentials that I have difficulty locating elsewhere.) There was no sign of the GT’s, indeed, of any raw kombucha. Finally, an employee pointed me toward the little sign on the cold-drink fridge, which you see at right.
The tone of the sign is very similar to the noise being made about the withdrawal of raw milk from Whole Foods a couple months back, suggesting it was temporary when, in fact, it was permanent.
According to a beverage industry publication, all this has come about because of regulator concerns (what else?) that the alcohol level in raw kombucha is occasionally above the promised maximum of 0.5%.
If you read the article in the beverage industry publication, you learn that kombucha has grown to represent more than $40 million annual sales. You also see that the whole thing may represent a competitive power play to de-throne the kombucha industry leader, GT’s, and replace it with…you guessed it…pasteurized kombucha. And lo and behold, still on the Whole Foods shelf this morning were a few bottles of Kombucha Wonder Drink. I figured they were mistakenly left in the recall confusion, and grabbed a bottle. I couldn’t find anything on the bottle that says it’s pasteurized (now there’s a potential labeling violation), but if you go to its web site, the pasteurization and the product’s continuing availability are front and center, part of a “news alert.”
Isn’t the idea of “pasteurized kombucha” something of a contradiction in terms? It seems pasteurized kombucha doesn’t have any of the alcohol problems because the fermentation pretty much dies with the bacteria killed off in pasteurization.
Among the many food problems discussed here in the past, one important one seems to be that our mass market culture is simply incompatible with living foods. Because they are living, such foods vary slightly one from the other. But that appears to be intolerable in our sanitized ultra-predictable culture. I remember hearing a Harvard Business School professor some years ago explain the success of McDonald’s being a function of “insurance,” as in, “I know that whichever McDonald’s I go to, I will get the exact same food I received in one hundreds or thousands of miles away.” Insurance against surprises.
The only way to be sure of obtaining the living foods we want will be to produce them ourselves, or have access to small producers who sell direct to consumers. That may help explain further the current assault on raw milk buying clubs in Massachusetts and Wisconsin. No toleration of surprises.
***
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, in a brief legal statement, has objected to the response filed by the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund to FDA’s motion to dismiss. Along with its objections to various legal arguments is the FDA’s suggestion that it wasn’t involved in the forced dumping of raw milk brought into Georgia from South Carolina last fall.
It characterizes as “bizarre” the “allegations of plaintiff Eric Wagoner, who claims that although his truck was ‘searched and seized by officials from Georgia,’ he destroyed the unpasteurized milk inside under orders from ‘FDA without a warrant or other legal process.'”
The agency’s lawyers add, “Had FDA actually ordered the destruction of the milk as alleged, which FDA may accomplish by means of the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act’s in rem seizure provision, 21 U.S.C. § 334, the proper venue in which to object would have been in the seizure action itself, wherein Mr. Wagoner would have had ‘an opportunity to appear as a claimant and to have a full hearing before the court.'”
Gary Cox, the FTCLDF lawyer, says he has video proof of the FDA’s involvement in the seizure.
People have a right to get (purchase) living food…and in a way, that the conventional commercial food delivery system does not (or can’t) want to supply it might be a good thing…..that is unless the grocer lobby joins with Big Milk and other monied special interests to prevent small farmers and other entreprenuers from serving the demand.
In a way this might be a good thing….giving the small guy the chance to sell kombucha. I offer it to my customers, and many appreciate the ‘not having to stay on top of it’ to drink it.
Mark, your buddies over at Whole Foods have no guts, or they are being blackmailed into succumbing to the wishes of the evil ones. Either way they deserve no support from those who see the value in eating living food. A solid boycott is truly in order.
http://smallnotebook.org/2009/07/27/how-to-make-kombucha-tea/
Years ago when I took microbiology, my professor was actually a medical doctor from the state university who was thrilled to hear that I was experimenting with kombucha, beet kvass, and other fermented drinks. There are many great folks out there that know the truth about our need for living foods. The regulators cannot eliminate our access to real foods because they are gifts from the earth.
I also don’t understand where there is any food safety risk in Kombucha. It is a very low pH product (usually under pH 3.0) and frankly lacks any nutrients to support the existance or growth of pathogenic organisms since it is just sucrose and tea, as opposed to the complex of fats, protiens, and minerals which accompany the milk sugar (lactose) in milk.
There’s a rich wide network out there; I see et at least 3 emails a week looking for either kefir grains or Kombucha Scobies (yesterday, pork blood to make blood sausages) from our food network. The buzz around real food is alive and thriving!
The government can’t beat us; so they may as well follow us. They look like complete fools trying to regulate germs. We’re even bigger fools to even entertain their ideas.
Miguel’s links had me laughing. Bio-security? Are they serious?
David – I’ll mail you a Scoby for free? Oh BTW, I shoveled manure today. I’ll wash my hands, but I refuse to wear boots or use disinfectants….
MIguel, thanks for posting Mark Purdey.. He’s an unsung hero of mine, and I hope everyone gets the chance to read his articles about BSE and TB. Who bought that prion theory? Mad cow disease – good for campfire stories.
FTCLDF I send my praise and respect to you! I have never seen this frank disclosure before. This is truly rich.
CP, If you think outlawing germs will improve the human condition, then have at it. Just for the record, more hamburger recalls this week. I’m sure you’re on it, right? Right? for the good of the children???
-blair
A pregnant woman was purchasing a case of kombucha (at a store in the South San Francisco Bay Area). Some employees made a joke about her "sneaking" in some alcohol. She overheard the comment and was offended. Unaware that there was any alcohol in kombucha and quite upset, she expressed her concerns to the store management. Her complaint is what resulted in the product being pulled.
Supposedly, anyhow, that’s how it happened. I’m curious to know if that’s really the case.
In other words, if that story is anywhere close to accurate, it’s got nothing to do with pasteurization, organisms, or contamination. Everything to do with alcohol content.
Unfortunately the product has been pulled from other stores as well, not just Whole Foods. Even in Santa Cruz, CA of all places. There the sign leaves one with the impression that the products will be back. And another sign directs customers to the deli where they are selling kombucha on tap. (Perhaps made by one of the locally-based kombucha producers?)
http://www.staffoflifemarket.com/news.php?id=28&keywords=Attention_Kombucha_Drinkers_._._.
"It started when Lindsey Lohans SCRAM-shackle (a court-ordered device measuring alcohol content in the blood) blared an alarm on June 5 that there was alcohol in her bloodstream after the MTV Movie Awards. The actress swore she had only been drinking kombucha, and thats what caught the attention of the grand poohbahs at Whole Foods. A corporate giant pulling a hot seller from the shelves got the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau talking to the FDA, who decided they needed to intervene.
"A statement issued yesterday by the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) frames the issue more as a labeling problem than anything:
TTB plans to take samples of kombucha products from the marketplace and test their alcohol content in order to determine if the products are labeled in compliance with Federal law. If TTB finds alcohol beverages that are not labeled in accordance with Federal law, we will take appropriate steps to bring them into compliance. TTB will consult with FDA to ensure that the affected products comply with applicable Federal laws. If the testing results from this labeling initiative indicate potential violations of the IRC, they will be referred to the appropriate office within TTB for further investigation, as necessary."
http://localnourishment.com/2010/06/24/whole-foods-market-pulls-kombucha-the-real-story/
http://news.softpedia.com/news/Kombucha-Tea-Alerting-SCRAM-Bracelet-on-Lindsay-Lohan-145059.shtml
Joseph- What profound words of so many years ago that ring true.
I believe on the bottle of kombucha tea it states the alcohol content. If the story is true about the pregnant woman, then shame on her for not reading labels and shame on wholefoods for their stupidity again. Just how much of the tea would she need to consume before it had any affect on her or her pregnancy? I can only imagine it’d be gallons. Do you think she consumes gallon a day? Doubtful.
Sunday I’ll have to remember to look for the tea at the CO-OP and see if they are still selling it. As for those who are court ordered away form certain items, why penalize others? Will they outlaw all booze? I like to cook with alcohol and a good Beaujolais is nice every so often.
Thanks for the links on making the tea.
Because consumers like their kombucha so sweet like soda pop, there is still a lot of residual sugar in the bottled product. Since the fermentation is now anaerobic, any alcohol cannot be turned into acetic acid.
As I understand it, pasteurization kills off most of the kombucha’s bacteria that promote fermentation, thus slowing the fermentation down.
Jeannette,
Not sure we’ll ever know if the pregnant woman or Lindsey Lohan stories are true; I’m inclined to believe the one in BevNet about the Maine regulator who "discovered" the problem and alerted federal officials (last two paragraphs of article).
http://www.bevnet.com/news/2010/6-22-2010-kombucha_honest_GT_Hain
Miguel,
Presume your comment about getting drunk from kombucha is, er, tongue in cheek. I’ve been drinking the commercial kombucha for quite a while, and am pretty sensitive to alcohol, and have never felt even the slightest effect.
Blair,
Appreciate your offer of scoby–I’ll write you separately with info. Maybe there’s a business in selling the scoby to all the Whole Foods kombucha addicts now in withdrawal?
David
Unfortunately our American culture of convience and sweet-tooth is not conducive to this.
Once you bottle it (cut it off from oxygen, thus preventing the oxidation of alcohol into acetic acid) and try to store it (which will cause the yeast to continue fermenting alcohol — an anaerobic fermentation) the alcohol content will increase. The cold temperatures of refrigeration will certainly slow this process to snails pace, but it will happen slowly over time.
Not neccessarily a bad thing to fully ferment your kombucha. I am a home-brewer of beer, cider, and other libations, and I like all my drinks very traditional and well attenuated (dry). But unfortunately, the American palate doesn’t like this so much, thus the kombucha with increasing alcohol content as it sits on the store shelf.
We are starting to tread on more regulatory feet here. Alcohol licensing is as onerous, if not moreso, than dairy licensing. The mandated "3 tier system" in alcohol distribution (producer — distributor — retailer) was a result of prohibition. Because the mob controlled all booz distribution during prohibition, they wanted to maintin their privileged position after prohibition was repealed. And so they instituted a mandatory middle-man, the "wholesaler" (distributer) which all producers and importers must go through, and all retailers and bars must buy from.
Talk about monopoly.
It is sad, that this totally safe and wholesome drink is going to now going to experience a barrage of regulatory onslaught. If nothing else, we ought to learn not put put so much darn sugar in it.
FIGHT BACK!
There is nothing to joke about with E.coli outbreaks and sick children. It doesnt matter if it is beef, leafy greens or raw milk. Sick children suffering from a foodborne pathogen is a heartache. Our meat supply in the U.S. is has become quite dangerous. The same pathogens that are in this CAFO meat are showing up in grass fed produced raw milk. Since you sit on the board to the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund, I can see why your perspective is a bit tainted. Noone in your group wants to believe that raw milk is getting people ill. Why is that Blair? The blinders will be the death of raw milk.
This Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund is not seen as a workable, reasonable group of people..defending the Hartmann case. Really bad move. I guess protecting the ideals of the raw milk movement is more important than addressing reality; the contamination problem that is occurring. Very sad and mostly for the children.
I do find it interesting that you dont dismiss the information about the recall on contaminated beef, to have a hard time believing it when it is raw milk. Blair making the choice to be a board member for FTCLDF means youve taken a serious leadership role in the raw milk movement. It means you condone the practices at the Hartmann farm. I will now hold you personally responsible for any future sick children who have consumed raw milk. Youre now part of the false information propaganda within the raw milk movement. Look in the mirror the next time a child becomes sick from raw milk and ask yourself, What am I trying to prove?
cp
cp,
Why was the same strain found in all of this hamburger?The same strain from two different distributors.Was it all from one batch of burger?It says"processing distributors" so I am thinking that the same strain was found in two different batches one on the west coast and one on the east coast. Interesting isn’t it.Do you suppose this will be tracked back to a single point source?I think it is more likely that there is the same chemical in both of these batches and that the presence of that chemical selects for the growth of that particular strain of o157:H7.Remember ,it is the terrain that determines what strains of bacteria will be favored to survive.
Since it is from 2 different places (almost 4000 miles NYC to LA) would the probability of the place of origin be the meat packing plant(s)? It still is a Jungle out there.
Was this the same beef that has been inspected and PASSED? It must have passed inspection by the feds or it couldn’t have been sold for human consumption….right?
CP is hoping and expecting sickness from raw milk so CP can blame Blair.
CP are you mentally ill?
Miguel makes an interesting point. Two coasts, one strain?? Perhaps, these two plants use the same disinfectant? Or, perhaps the Hartmann farm sent one of their cattle to slaughter and pieces of it ended up 2500 miles apart?? š
This business of chasing microbes around the country sure gets to be exhausting.
Kudos to you for bringing up the DNA fingerprinting in the context of a beef outbreak. Of course, we still disagree, but THANK YOU for moving the conversation to another type of outbreak. You say…
"I think it is more likely that there is the same chemical in both of these batches and that the presence of that chemical selects for the growth of that particular strain of o157:H7."
What chemical? PFGE cuts the chromosome the same whether the bacteria comes from raw milk or beef. What are you talking about there?
You actually explain the most likely hypothesis perfectly in the previous sentence:
"The same strain from two different distributors.Was it all from one batch of burger?It says"processing distributors" so I am thinking that the same strain was found in two different batches one on the west coast and one on the east coast. Interesting isn’t it.Do you suppose this will be tracked back to a single point source?"
I wouldn’t suppose anything, but follow the data. This is detective work. Yes, if the DNA fingerprint is found on 2 coasts, and there is a common source of beef with the same fingerprint, from the same common source/distributor, who would question that from a forensic point-of-view? Probably no one would question the connection other than the lawyers from the CAFO that supplied the beef.
MW
I’ve never felt the least intoxicated from either store-bought or home-made Kombucha either. It’s just a refreshing tea-based drink.
RE recent outbreak in Michigan
I received a forwarded email from a Hartmann shareholder. I asked for permission to post, but so far have not received a response. This email came from a respected source and relative of one of our Colorado shareholders. Below I paraphrase some of the contents:
– MDH believes the court victory in 2005 that allowed Hartmann’s to sell beef from their farm was an affront to their existence. They were outside the law, and the judge told them so.
– Hartmann’s have less than 40 cows, on rotated pasture. They do this because they believe this is better for the cows, and their customers.
– The MDH did not release in the press reports that there was no e.coli found in any of the raw milk, cream, butter, yogurt and whey. The lab results showed e.coli in samples of raw milk cheddar and gouda, but those were not identified as e.coli 0157, the pathogenic form of the organism. (There are hundreds of strains of e.coli, and all but a few are beneficial, so unless the sample contained an pathogenic strain, then it would not cause food poisoning.)
– About a week before the Hartmanns’ raw milk was identified as a source of e.coli illness, there was a report in the May 17 issue of naturalnews.com that the FDA is recruiting state agencies to stop the sale of raw milk. (See link:
http://www.naturalnews.com/028799_pasteurized_milk_raw.html) Is this coincidence?
-The child that was hospitalized and diagnosed with HUS did not drink raw milk, according to the parents. He was given antibiotics that induced HUS – not caused by raw milk but by faulty medical practice. No urgent public education about that issue…but of course, they are all about public health issues…..
– Despite no pathogens found in the beef, they destroyed it, and shut the dairy down. The same standards are not applied to restaurants by MDH.
– The media campaign has been out of proportion to the evidence at hand. There is a concerted effort to undermine the confidence of the Hartmann customers.
….
I don’t trust anything MDH says. What Miguel and others are saying about the nature of illness is more substantive and credible.
-Blair
p.s. CP, forgive me if I’m wrong, but I believe everything you write has false pretensions and offends civil boundaries, and therefore warrants no response.
Bob BubbaBozo Hayles
It’s seems that there is nothing but bad news for the Hartmann’s. Do they plan to fight this and keep on farming and selling products?
Please don’t say anything if it will jeopardize them.
This business of chasing microbes around the country, is no doubt "exhausting" not to mention perplexing and opportunistic.
As Mirjam Czjzek, one of the study leaders from the following article states The link to the Japanese human gut bacteria was just a very lucky, opportunistic hit that we clearly had no idea about before starting our project. Like so often in science, chance is a good collaborative fellow!
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2010/04/07/gut-bacteria-in-japanese-people-borrowed-sushi-digesting-genes-from-ocean-bacteria/
The above article also states, Fortunately, bacteria arent just limited to the genes that they inherit from their ancestors. Individuals can swap genes as easily as we humans trade money or gifts. This horizontal gene transfer means that bacteria have an entire kingdom of genes, ripe for the borrowing. All they need to do is sidle up to the right donor.
Also from the above article Ruth Ley, states that, People have been saying that gut microbes can pick up genes from environmental microbes but its never been demonstrated as beautifully as in this paper.
Ken Conrad
Another farm invaded by the benign folks at MAD in addition to being accused of selling the most dangerous food product known to man raw milk they think he sold fruit WITHOUT THEIR [MADs]PERMISSION.
"Probably no one would question the connection other than the lawyers from the CAFO that supplied the beef."
Yes, but they should question the connection That is the only way they will ever solve the problem of people getting sick from the beef.
Meat processors need to learn something from genetic engineers.When a genetic engineer wants an e.coli that will do a specific task,he doesn’t search the world for that particular bacteria.He or she simply takes any common e.coli and engineers it to make the protein or whatever is needed.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090726150835.htm
"We accelerated evolution, generating as many as 15 billion genetic variants in three days"
15 billion genetic variants of e.coli in three days,all created from one strain of e.coli.
How is this possible?
"We decided to engineer in the context of biology, embracing evolution rather than trying to fit a square peg in a round hole,"
Using the natural abilities of e.coli to self engineer when faced with stress.
Now look at the meat processing plant with this amazing ability of e.coli to adapt to stress in mind.Because the meat processors are concerned about e.coli contamination of the meat they employ several different methods to kill bacteria.They do kill most of the bacteria,but the ones that survive have done some self engineering in order to survive the stress.If the East Coast Plant uses the same methods and chemicals to kill bacteria as the West Coast Plant,it is likely that they will end up with the same strain of e.coli.Because these plants employ lots of machinery to process the meat ,that machinery has to be repeatedly disinfected somehow.Because they are concerned about killing bacteria,chemical residues on the machinery that contaminate the meat are not thought to be a problem.
It is not the presence of bacteria in the meat that is the real problem.There are lots of bacteria already in everyone’s digestive system.They will self engineer to respond to stress in the same way those bacteria in the processing plant do.It is the chemical residues in the meat that do the damage to our digestive systems.These chemical residues are what upsets the balance of bacteria in our gut.The chemical residues kill some of the cells of our digestive system and cause the illness.The bacteria is taking the blame for damage that was caused by chemical burns.
Maybe these processing plants are just too big to keep clean without employing strong disinfectants. So, if the bacteria are not to blame,why waste our time trying to track them down?
Blair,
A point of clarification. E. coli O157:H7 is not the only pathogenic strain of E. coli, and the state found some of these other shiga-toxigenic E. coli strains in the Hartmann’s raw milk cheeses. These strains are not part of the natural flora of properly made raw milk cheese, so something went wrong during or after the process. I think the Hartmann’s and their customers should be concerned about that, especially if they are feeding this cheese to their children. What’s debatable is whether the event needed to be front page news, or if the regulators could have iinstead dealt with the situation more discretely. But, the Hartmann’s themselves played a role in making this outbreak so newsworthy by forcing a warrant.
Below is an example of a recent outbreak due to one of the other shiga-toxigenic E. coli strains:
http://www.cdc.gov/ecoli/2010/ecoli_o145/index.html
MW
MW, don’t you mean "asking the health department to show the reason that they are using force to enter the farm?" You have got the whole situation bass ackwards.
The workhorse of bacteria for this kind of biotechnology is E.coli.
I was referring to the potential for negative PR by requiring a search warrant. Here’s an example where the media isn’t showing much sympathy for the dairy in MN.
http://www.startribune.com/opinion/editorials/97196864.html?elr=KArksi8cyaiUHK:uUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU
MW
So let me get this straight. You are allowed to bully someone to do something. If they do it, and you don’t have the legal right to bully them, you can’t be held accountable for doing so. Do I have that right?
Did they not watch the video of their own agent, MaryBeth Willis, ordering me to destroy the milk because it was in violation of FDA rule 21 CFR 1240 61?
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