Health Benefits, Nutrition Facts, Making Kefir at Home

You can’t walk into a health food store without seeing promotional signs for probiotics. That’s because probiotics are considered one of the best things you can do for your digestion – right up there with stress relief and getting enough fiber and water to stay regular.

Probiotics are found in yogurt and kefir, another cultured milk product that’s getting a lot of attention. We’d like to talk about the extraordinary health benefits of kefir to encourage you to get this tangy drink into your diet, but let’s start with probiotics.

Probiotics are the live organisms, including healthy bacteria, which are naturally found in our digestive tracts. These organisms help stem the growth of harmful bacteria and boost our immune systems. Our gut has just as much a say in our overall outlook as our brain does, studies show, so keeping our digestion humming along makes us both healthy and happy.

On that happy note, we’ll introduce you to kefir (pronounced kee-fer), the fermented milk drink that originates from the Caucasus Mountains in Eastern Europe. The name has been traced to the Turkish word “keif” which means good feeling. Happy gut, happy feeling! The flavor, if you haven’t tried it, is naturally sweet and mildly tangy as well.

Nutritional value of kefirr
Kefir health benefits are many. Kefir is a rich source of calcium, protein and B vitamins. It packs more probiotics than even yogurt, because kefir is made by fermenting milk with 10 to 20 different types of bacteria and yeasts, where yogurt usually is fermented with a handful of types, giving kefir a higher probiotic count in the final product.

When you’re buying kefir, go with the plain version to avoid added sugars – then you can add your own pureed fruit for flavor at home. Have a look at the nutrition breakdown for nonfat kefir here.

How to make kefir at home

Milk kefirr
Kefir is made from gelatinous white or yellow particles called “grains.” They aren’t an actual grain like wheat, but are made of bacteria and yeast, clumped together with casein (milk proteins) and complex sugars. They look like small clumps of cauliflower!.

Read more at http://www.belmarrahealth.com/kefir-health-benefits/