The Science Behind Nourish Kefir.
Evidence of the effectiveness of Nourish brand of kefir drinks made with real kefir grains.
In 2019, Nourish Kefir embarked on a Nourish Kefir DNA analysis (Metagenomic analysis) through CAMPDEN BRI, a UKAS accredited leading British laboratory. The analysis was funded by LAFIC through European Redevelopment Funding managed by the Greater London Authority. The bacteria species identified were interesting and the results were complex, creating more questions than answers, which is why it has taken us a while to provide that information here.
When we ferment live kefir grains they evolve and change and become slightly different. And over time, here at Nourish we have developed our own unique strains of LAB – lactic acid bacteria. What this means is the dominant bacteria in Nourish is a type of lactococcus LAB, because it’s new and it’s ours, you only find it in Nourish Kefir. It has become the dominant bacteria in our drinks.
What can we tell you from the analysis?
We can tell you that a staggering 200+ different species were identified in our fermented milk drinks! And that’s just bacteria – the lab we used was simply testing LABs
Yes, over 200 different types… It’s a staggering result, however these strains of bacteria do not appear in equal quantities. Certain types dominate and there are many more of these than an even amount of 200 different species…
So let’s tell you about those that dominate:
Organic Cow’s Milk Kefir – our original miracle milk launched in 2007, but made by us with our own kefir grains since 2009 – what’s in it? Well the kefir grains ferment in the milk and transform it, the bacteria feed off the milk, and the most dominant strains increase in numbers – and these types appear the most:
The most dominant strain is our own proprietary strain of Lactococcus. There are other Lactococcus genus also present including Lactis then Fujiensis and Raffinolactis.
the next dominant strain is a Leuconostoc genus with sub species Mesenteroides and pseudomesenteroides and palmae present, followed by Lactobacillus species Kefiranofaciens, Lactobacillus Kefiri – these two as the name implies are only found in kefir grains. Other types of Lactobacillus species present in our drinks include Otakiensis, Ulyunensis, plus Faeni and Buchneri, parakefiri, apia, brantae, gigeriorum and Japonicus. Another LAB species present in kefir is Streptococcus including the species Dentirousetti and fryi, halichoeri and Milleri.
In the bacteria family Enterococcaceae we found some interesting genus in our kefir including Enterococcus, Tetragenococcus, vagococcus. Other LAB families discovered are Carnobacteriaceae and Acetobacteraceae. As for yeasts? We know our kefir contains Saccaromyces cerevisae, but the Campden analysis was soley on bacteria – so we will have to get a separate analysis undertaken in future to learn more about the amazing probiotic yeasts present in our drinks.
Goat’s Milk Kefir
As you would expect, many of the same bacteria are present. We isolated our kefir grains and grew them in goats milk for about 18 months before we began producing goats kefir drinks. We source our goat milk from a well known UK supplier for guaranteed quality. We know that kefir grains will change according to the milk they are fermented in. So what did we learn about our goats milk kefir drinks that was different to cow’s milk kefir? The results were more or less the same as cow’s results provided above. Our proprietary Lactococcus genus being the most dominant species, followed by fujiensis, lactis, then Leuronostoc, then Lactobacillus kefiri and kefiranofaiens, and otakiensis. Lactococcus raffinolactis was also present in greater amounts than in our cow’s kefir. And Lactobacillus ultunensis was in goats but not identified in great numbers cow’s kefir.
What does this tell us about kefir made from grains?
The most important thing to take from this info is that kefir made from actual real kefir grains contains a broad spectrum of different types of LAB and yeasts. In our opinion it is the process of fermenting kefir grains that makes real kefir more special, not because it contains 10 or 20 or even 50 species, but because these species occured naturally in nature. We didn’t add them one by one. They combine synergistically to provide the most wholesum nourishing drink that will benefit your body on so many different levels, from being organic, nutritious – with fats, proteins, carbs, vitamins and minerals. Being easy to digest because it’s fermented. Assisting in digestion of other foods, then then – if that wasn’t enough already – helps to push out bad bacteria – it’s acidic and replace with a diverse range of good bacteria that perform different functions, from antimicrobial activity, antiviral activity, enzymatic activity – which all help our intestinal tracts to work properly, reduce inflamation, support normal bowel function, enable assimilation of nutrients, communicate with the brain… This is one natural, humble simple kefir grain – that does all this – not isolated, separated, sugar grown on agar plates in a lab – just nature provided wonderfulness!