Probiotics are beneficial for everyone- ever since I started reading about traditional diets 6 years ago, I notice all the ‘new’ discoveries about probiotics helping with digestion, autoimmune disorders, and other chronic conditions. In reality, they used to be a part of everyone’s whole food’s diet; probiotics were used in the past to preserve fresh foods like vegetables, fruits, dairy, and even meat.
Before our clean modern lives, working in the dirt and with animals was a part of most healthy people’s daily activities. Now, we can go days without even getting our hands dirty!
Probiotics are a big part of the GAPS diet. See the Gut-Brain Connection post for more information about the role they play with chronic conditions such as autism, allergies, and eczema.
These healthy microbes can be gotten a variety of ways, here are 10.
1. Kimchi. This cultured multi-vegetable mix is a flavorful condiment to eat alongside savory dishes.
2. Kombucha is a fermented sweet tea. You can buy it in stores, or very easily and inexpensively make it yourself once you have the ‘mother’.
3. Saurkraut, when made at home is full of active cultures. I literally make a gallon of kraut at a time; it’s super inexpensive and my children love it when I make it out of purple cabbage or combine the green and purple (it cultures to make pink!). Culturing the cabbage makes the vitamins more accessible to our bodies as well.
4. Milk kefir is super super easy, I put off making it for years because I had never heard of it, but you literally just drop the kefir grains (not really grains) into room temperature milk, allow to sit for 12-24 hours, and then strain them out. Use in smoothies, popsicles, and just drink plain.
5. Beet Kvass can be re-made using the same beets multiple times. Beets are thought to fight cancer and increase the amounts of oxygen your blood can carry. Kvass can be taken straight, or used in salad dressings. It’s a beautiful red color.
6. When your’e looking for intense healing, probiotics can be purchased in supplement form. Research carefully to make sure you’re not throwing your money away on an inactive or old supplement; I’ve used Biokult in the past, and I saw die off from them, so I know they were active and working.
7. Playing outside in healthy natural areas allows us to breathe in the healthy microbes that are keeping the soil and ecosystem in balance. A beautiful forest is a much better choice than, say, a supermarket shopping cart- the forest has checks and balances within nature and beneficial bacteria keep the bad ones from overpopulating. A supermarket shopping cart is likely also full of bacteria, but since they often have been wiped down with antibiotic wipes, or had diapers leak on them from ill children, those microbes are much less likely to be the good kind.
8. Yogurt is the most commonly accepted probiotic in our culture. It’s way cheaper to make your own, did you know that? For less than $10 and an hour you can make 12 8-ounce individual servings to have on hand. See instructions here.
9. Chutneys, this one is peach, are preserved with probiotics and are delicious. Use them to extend the short peach season.
10. Pickles are eaten by most people, but the kind you buy in stores are usually NOT full of probiotics. You can make your own, or purchase naturally fermented pickles most health food stores. I’ve made some great pickles on my own, but they turn out different depending on the temperature they’re cultured at, so I choose to buy them most of the time because I like the consistency better.
You can find recipes for probiotics to be made weekly, and consumed daily for optimal health in the Grain Free Meal Plans! CLICK HERE to learn more!
Free Ebook this month only: 20 Grain-Free Breakfast Recipes
20 Delicious Breakfast Recipes suitable for GAPS and Paleo diets!
Thank you for this! I’ve been looking for the answer to this question for months and was wondering what you did: how did you reach the therapeutic level of probiotics that dr. Natasha recommends? I know that you should take 8-10 capsules of biokult for an adult, but with three people in my family on gaps, that is pretty expensive. If you were to take 2 capsules or so and supplement the rest with fermented food, how would you know much fermented foods to consume to make up the difference? If you need 15-20 billion bacteria cells a day, how do you know how many bacteria cells in sauerkraut or kefir, etc.?
Good question! I’ll try to research it more exactly too, and do a post about it. But yes, I did theraputic doses of probiotics but only for me for a month (it took me another month before to work up to 8 capsules). I kept my daughter on 3-4 capsules a day for 2-1/2 years.
For the cultures, from what I understand there are way more in fermented foods, but I’ve never got a die off reaction from kraut or kefir or anything and we eat 1/2-1 cup of cultured veggie as a side dish fairly often. I think Biokult might have different more aggressive strains in it? Not sure!
I would love it if you could do a post on what you find! Thanks for your site!
In one of Dr. Mercola’s posts about fermenting veggies he states that the number of goodies in veggies is much higher than in supplement capsules. Of course, right now I can’t find the quote… : )
I was looking for that quote too and just found it: “I would strongly encourage you to eat 4-6 ounces a day of fermented vegetables, which will supply you with about 10 trillion beneficial bacteria. That’s about 10 percent of the total microbial population of your gut, and can equate to an entire bottle of most probiotics supplements. Ideally you should consume them regularly if not daily. ” from this link: http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/05/06/arthritis-treatment.aspx
About pickles– you should watch the pickle video that The Healthy Home Economist (just google that) has! whenever I made cultured pickles they were always mushy– but now, that I am using oak leaves (tannin in them inhibits the enzyme that breaks down the fiber of the cucumber) –they are turning out wonderfully crisp and taste just like Claussen’s! You’ ve got to try it! So easy and such great results!
I see that you mention buying pickles. What kind do you buy and is there anywhere to order good pickles that contain probiotics online? I have heard of Bubbies, but can’t find them anywhere!
You don’t mention Water Kefir Grains in your list. Is this something you have ever made?
Thank you for all your great info — I reference your blog & ebks often.
What do you think about Donna Gates with the Body Ecology Diet suggesting to stay away from certain ferments such as Kombucha — that it is counterproductive in controlling yeast…
I also purchase Bubbies (I love them) but isn’t it “pickled” with just salt? Doesn’t it have to be fermented with whey in order for it to be considered a trully cultured food?
I make cultured kraut without whey all the time, the salt inhibits the bad flora from growing, and the good ones take over. I really like the Body Ecology Diet, and I would recommend using that if whatever diet you were on didn’t work. She doesn’t include a lot of red meat, and we thrive on red meat over here so we were better suited for GAPS.
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Can you use Kombucha as a probiotic in the first of the intro stage none of my veggies are ready!
Thank you for your site!
I’d either pick up Bubbies kraut at a health food store, or skip the probiotics. I think kombucha would be too high carb for intro :)
Thank you. I had 3 Tbs. hopefully it won’t harm the intro. I am through day 2 and really hope to move on.