Welcome back!

This is our last step! Here’s what you’ll need:

• An empty glass jar (or jars) for storage of approximately six cups of rejuvelac—the typical amount yielded for me from one cup of soaked, sprouted and fermented rye berries. Any glass jars that were used to store pickles, olives or spaghetti sauce can be re-purposed as storage containers for your rejuvelac (just make sure you get rid of the old odors and tastes first).
• A small funnel (optional, but highly recommend)
• Six more cups of water if you want to make another batch (optional).

The rejuvelac will look like this after 48 hours of fermenting.

It should look cloudy with a pale yellow color (similar to freshly squeezed lemonade). Remember in Part 3 when I told you not to shake the jar? You’re still not going to shake the jar! But you will need to pick the jar up and tip it to the side to decant the rejuvelac. As you move the jar you will see small bubbles running from the bottom to the top of the jar. The fermentation process creates carbonation. Another byproduct of fermenting is the foam floating at the top of the jar. Neither the bubbles nor the foam will hurt you.

Now tip the half-gallon jar with the rejuvelac to transfer the rejuvelac to the storage jar. You do not want the rye berries in your drink and keeping the cheesecloth secured to the jar ensures the rejuvelac will separate from the rye berries. Placing a small funnel at the neck of your storage jar makes the transfer process from berry jar to storage jar a lot less messy.

Here’s the finished product—two 1&frac; pint jars of rejuvelac, giving me a total of six cups!

I highly recommend putting the rejuvelac into the fridge for an hour or so to get cold before drinking. I like it best cold!

Now what to do with the sad-looking rye berry jar??

Great news—you can use it for two more days to make more and more rejuvelac! Refill the jar with six or more cups of water and let it ferment again over night and then decant it after 24 hours. I usually do three total decantings—one from the 48 hour fermentation and two more from two 24 hour fermentations.

I’’ve read that if you have leftover rejuvelac that you don’t want you can use it to water your plants with!

As for the rye berries I have a special story for that:

I have a freezer bag filled with old berries I’ve used for rejuvelac. On April 18, 2014 when Pete and I go down to Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana to celebrate our second wedding anniversary, we are going to take the leftover berries with us and use them to feed the fat squirrels on campus! So you can either throw away your leftover berries or you can feed them to small critters in your local park, but take the berries away from your house to give to animals. If you feed the critters at your house you will have repeat, nuisance visitors. Nobody likes a pest!

When Pete and I go to Bloomington, we always stop at Oliver Winery! When we visited Oliver Winery in 2012 we acquired a free wine tote bag with six storage slots for carrying six bottles of wine. You know what else the wine tote is great for? Taking your glass jars of rejuvelac with you when you’re on the go.

Peace,
Sara