‘Apple a day keeps the doctor away’ – this apple drink for sure will prove this old saying perfectly. You will love this easy and delicious Apple Kvass on a hot summer days.
Double the benefits of apple when you ferment it for good bacteria. By enjoying naturally fermented foods like kvass, sauerkraut, pickles, kimchi or kefir you can bypass expensive probiotic supplements. Homemade ferments are excellent for your health. They populate your gut with healthy bacteria, healing and nourishing it and helping your overall physical and emotional health.
Cultures around the world figured out how to not only save their produce but also grow beneficial bacteria which would naturally preserve the food long before refrigeration took over. This process resulted in a food or drink that could be safely kept in a root cellar for long periods of time. However, once modernized society conveniences came on board, we slowly walked away from delicious fermented foods, and instead turned into storing things in the fridge and ingesting canned foods. This may seem like a harmless shift in modern society at first, but this change meant that most people stopped consuming the beneficial yeast and bacteria that were abundant in these cultured foods. The benefits to eating fermented foods and beverages are incredible – and we’ve been doing this for CENTURIES! Consuming fermented foods is like sending a massive amount of good-bacteria soldiers into your gut to boost your immune system.
What if I tell you that you could make a drink that tastes just like soda, but healthy?
Kvass is a traditional fermented beverage originated from eastern european countries like Russia and Ukraine that typically uses rye bread to make it. But you can also make kvass from fruits and vegetables as well. Even kids love them and they make a great and healthy alternative to commercial soda. The natural alcohol level in this delicious Apple Kvass is very very low, about 0.05%-1.0%, which means it’s totally safe for kids.
Ingredients:
3 lb fresh apples, peeled and cut into quarters
1/2 cup sugar or honey
1 1/2 tsp active dry yeast
juice from 1 lemon
1/4 cup coffee
1 ginger root
1 gal filtered water
In a big pot combine apples, water, ginger, lemon juice and coffee. Bring to boil and add sugar. Simmer for 20 minutes. Turn off the heat and let the mixture cool down to be slightly warm. Once apple kvass mixture cools down, add yeast to the pot and mix well until dissolved.
Cover the pot and let it stand on the counter for 15 hours. I made this the night before and it was done by noon of the next day. Apple kvass will need to be strained through paper towel, cheese cloth or simply coffee filter and apples discarded. After which pour apple kvass into individual bottles and serve chilled.
- 3 lb fresh apples, peeled and cut into quarters
- 1/2 cup sugar or honey
- 1 1/2 tsp active dry yeast
- juice from 1 lemon
- 1/4 cup coffee
- 1 ginger root
- 1 gal filtered water
- In a big pot combine apples, water, ginger, lemon juice and coffee.
- Bring to boil and add sugar. Simmer for 20 minutes.
- Turn off the heat and let the mixture cool down to be slightly warm.
- Once apple kvass mixture cools down, add yeast to the pot and mix well until dissolved.
- Cover the pot and let it stand on the counter for 15 hours in the room temperature.
- Strain apple kvass through paper towel, cheese cloth or coffee filter and discard the apples.
- Pour apple kvass into individual bottles and serve chilled.
I would love to try this recipe. Could you please clarify how much water is needed? Thank you
Thank you, Christina! For every 3 pounds of apples you’ll need about 1 gallon of water. Let me know how it turns out!
I made this yesterday, I don’t hate it, but don’t love it either. I haven’t tried it chilled, its in the frig now chilling and I think that’ll be better. What’s with the coffee? I’m thinking it’d be better w/o coffee but wanted to try it as written first.
Hi Marie! The coffee is used for color purposes. Try substituting it with molasses. Hope you love it next time!
Using brown sugar instead of the coffee will also work to darken the final colour. Unrefined coconut sugar would also work, plus it has its own coffee like aroma which may be detectable in the final product.
Thank you Alan! I have to try your suggestions too!
Stepping in late: a traditional trick to darken kvas is to add toasted rye bread, cut into 1/2″ cubes or just torn up. (Classic kvas is just toast, water, sugar, and yeast. The main personal variable is how dark one prefers one’s kvas: the darker the roast, the darker and more savoury/bitter the final product. Fans of aggressive flavour outright burn the toast, filling the kitchen with smoke.)
If used for colour alone, you’d probably add about a cup of dark-roasted but not burnt rye bread cubes, which would impart a slightly richer flavour to the final product but no bitterness.
Steep and strain the toast cubes with the apples.
I did the recipe without the coffee, since it really didn’t seem necessary, and the result was ultimately pretty decent. The apple taste is actually rather a pleasant cider aroma, and while the ginger isn’t very strong, it adds a nice kick to a glass of the stuff. It makes for a super refreshing drink during summer. I believe it’d be infinitely better if it had time to carbonate a bit during a second fermentation process. Find sealable bottles that can hold this type of pressure and let the kvass rest in them on your counter for 5-6 days, that should do the trick.
I was wondering, do you have any suggestion about what to do with the apples once the fermenting time is over? It’d just be a shame to waste so many apples like that, but I can’t really think of anything to do with yeasty, soft apples.
This is a probiotic drink, is that right? How much should one drink a day?
I am not sure what you mean by ‘1 ginger root’ . A one inch piece?
Can you taste the coffee in the final product?