So I've been making yogurt and putting probiotics in them before putting the yogurt in the incubator in order to let the bacteria grow exponentially. I've been doing this to try to alleviate my IBS. The good news is that when I do it right I do in fact go back to having a normal gut, if only for the day. The problem is that my results are inconsistent, and not on a batch by batch basis, but instead a jar by jar basis (I make seven jars of yogurt per batch). Some days a particular jar will do absolutely nothing, other days the jar will contain the cure. I'm wondering what the problem could possibly be. I need to briefly explain how I make the yogurt to describe what I think may be going wrong:
1. First I heat up milk to 180 degrees and then let it cool down to around 100. 2. I take one cup of the cooled milk and pour it into a pyrex glass in which I mix the yogurt starter and probiotic pill. I pour the rest of the cooled milk into a pitcher. 3. I then take the mixed solution(right word?) and pour it back into the pitcher. 4. I then distribute the whole pitcher of milk out evenly into the seven jars to let it incubate.
I'm wondering if the problem is that the probiotic mixture from the pyrex isn't distributing itself evenly enough when I pour it back into the pitcher which causes some jars to be probiotic heavy while others to probiotic void. Any thoughts on what may be going wrong here or any ways to fix the above problem would be helpful. I thought that maybe I need to buy a scale and some weighing papers so I can place the probiotic and starter evenly into each jar and then fill it with the cooled milk. Only problem with this though is that 1. I don't know of a tool which could help me accomplish this and 2. don't know how I could separate each powder evenly. Is there some device that I could divide fine powder with and store briefly without losing a lot of the powder? Thanks
To me, it sounds like you may have a problem with sanitation. I would make sure that all the containers you keep it in aren't reused, or if they are, are cleaned at a high temperature (around 120 °F).
For the pills, you could try dividing it up into fourths or eighths with a sharp knife and then using a pill crusher to pulverize them. It might be a bit more expensive if you want to go with a scale, since you're going to need a balance with a lot of accuracy for things that small. If you do end up doing that, you could buy weigh boats to mass and store them temporarily.
Jaxson Sanders
Hmm that does sound very likely considering that the first time I used the jars all of them worked perfectly. The only problem is that I don't have a dishwasher and have to handwash. Any ways around this?
Luis Howard
What are the materials of the containers you reuse?
Camden Gray
Here's a pic of an uncleaned jar I use
Mason Nelson
...
Dylan Rodriguez
Probiotics are a meme
Camden Hill
Except when I make yogurt with them my severe ibs-c disappears.
Logan Powell
I would try filling the jar with water and microwaving it to raise the temperature. I read a NYT article that said you need to keep water at 150 °F for at least ten minutes to completely kill bacteria, so if I were you I would do this: fill up the jar all the way, heat it up for a certain amount of time in the microwave, and see what its temperature is after ten minutes. If it's above 150 °F, then it's good. If not, try a longer time. For cleaning the lid and the pitcher, you definitely don't want to microwave it, but you could try pouring the hot water into it and ensuring it remains hot enough for ten minutes.
Aaron Sullivan
The reason I say microwaving the glass instead of just pouring hot water into it is because rapid temperature changes can crack glass. I think the microwave would heat it up slow enough for this not to be a problem, but I would try to use a low power setting if possible.
Carter Perry
Ok thanks will definitely try this
Isaiah Garcia
part of your problem may be inconsistencies in the actual probiotic pill you are using.
There is also new research showing the use of L. Rhamnosus and peanut protein can retrain the immune system and achieve long term remission of fatal peanut allergy
good luck with the IBS
Brayden Reed
>I would advise using DSM17834 as the probiotic.
DSM17938
Jason Ramirez
Thanks. Ill try this probiotic if even after I sterilize my glass it continues not to work. Im using bb536 right now which has success treating constipation when made with yogurt.
Christopher Hall
after re-reading your OP, I'm left with a question > I mix the yogurt starter and probiotic pill.
what is the makeup of the 'yogurt starter' ? If it is as I suspect another Lactobacillus the problem may be in competition between the strains. I don't use anything but milk (red cap, whole milk) and the probiotic of choice to make my stuff. Also I do not allow the fermentation to progress to the point of 'yogurt' I refrigerate before that point. My thought is that I want maximum probiotic density / maximum LIVE culture. I've always thought this point occurred just before they run out of food. Full blown yogurt is just at or beyond that point, but before the die-off products start to make the product taste sour or bitter. FYI I was not able to find any serious adverse effects from probiotic overdose other than mild digestive problems.
Sebastian Myers
Yea some lactobacillus or other. I actually suspected the competition before and have made it without the starter which led to the least effective batch out of the six I have made so far. Another piece of evidence showing that the starter is probably not the issue is that the most effective batch was the first, which was made with the starter. I'm just honestly surprised how effective the yogurt is when I make it correctly, however that actually happens. At least I have my whole life to figure it out
Isaiah Adams
>how effective the yogurt is when I make it correctly
it is pretty amazing isn't it. If you look into it you'll find a lot of research has been looking into various probiotics including the bb536 and DSM17938 for infant gut problems. I think what will be found in the long run is that certain strains work to help cure / prevent certain situations but overall we need a whole zoo to be healthy. By pasteurizing all milk products and having very little naturally fermented food products in our diets we've divorced ourselves from the natural immune system re-enforcement that our ancestors evolved with.
Asher Mitchell
For fuck's sake... If you're not even attempting to preserve the stains that alleviate your IBS, what's the point?
You're playing a fucking roulette every time you abandon what's worked, hoping that microorganisms will just magically suit your needs in the next batch.
Seed, fool. Keep samples and keep track of what helps and what doesn't. Discard the failures and breed the successes. This is painfully basic.
Dominic Reed
I use starsan to sanitize all of my beer brewing equipment and it works very well and is food safe. It's what all home brewers and restaurants use on all their shit
Blake Sanders
Also home brew starters are usually just dextrose and water that's been boiled and cooled. Try using that as a starter and when you "pitch" your probiotic make sure the solution is completely cooled to room temperature.
Andrew Walker
have you thought about culturing your own probiotic create a mother and then add it to each jar individually?
Cooper Long
>3. (right word?) how does "mixture" sound?
Bentley Ross
Just boil the empty jars before using
Noah Collins
after further thought I wonder what the optimum growth medium is for Bifidobacterium longum BB536 since it's not a Lactobaccillus I wonder if milk is the best thing to grow it in?
In the case of DSM17938 which is a lactobaccillus I know it secretes an anti-microbal compound called reuterin which does kill neighboring bacteria...
William Perry
Any suggestions as to which medium might be better?
Caleb King
You could just be randomly doing better and worse and superstitiously associating the better days with the idea the yogurt's working. Your GI system in general is pretty susceptible to suggestion e.g. even people without IBS can give themselves bathroom trouble just by stressing out too much one day. That's what makes IBS so horrible, the realization having anxiety / negative thoughts can trigger bowel problems, which makes you feel anxious and have negative thoughts, which triggers more bowel problems, etc. Once you fall into the downward spiral it's just a matter of time before it escalates to full blown inflammatory bowel disease and you start shitting blood 30 times a day so they take your entire large intestine out and replace it with some coiled length of small intestine, and that helps for a couple months until the inflammation starts hitting up that new replacement stretch of intestine too and then you end up shitting wrong one day and bust open a fistula that drains fecal matter into your scrotum and the whole scrotal area becomes a mess with urine leaking out in all directions from the inflammation and bile acid burnt holes in your dying watering can -esque perineum and eventually one of your testicles pops out, black, shriveled and dead while you're straining to take a shit in the shower because it hurts too much to use the toilet like a normal person and all your shit is diarrhea now anyway so it goes down the drain easily enough.
Anthony Rogers
Thats cool and all and it's all in my head man, but on the days it works I shit logs. For the past seventeen months without the yogurt, I poop a few pebbles every few days. Haven't had a log shit in over 1.5 years until this so... yea. Mental ibs is more diarrhea kind, not constipation
Aiden Gonzalez
>what is placebo Really though microbe health is important
Elijah Collins
read en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bifidobacterium for some general info >The sensitivity of members of the genus Bifidobacterium to O2 generally limits probiotic activity to anaerobic habitats. > Infant-associated bifidobacterial phylotypes appear to have evolved the ability to ferment milk oligosaccharides, whereas adult-associated species use plant oligosaccharides, consistent with what they encounter in their respective environments. and here for some specific onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1472-765X.2005.01735.x/pdf >Conclusions: The results of this study demonstrated that fermented medida made from malted brown rice is a suitable food system for the delivery of B. longum BB 536 with a relatively stable shelf life
seems they used a mixture >Aims: To develop medida (a Sudanese fermented thin porridge) as a probiotic dietary adjunct with high total solids. >Methods and Results: Fifteen per cent brown rice flour of 2-day-old malted paddy and skim milk were used for formulation.
you might end up adding a bit of some vegetable material to your yogurt to serve as a growth medium for the bb536. Develop your google-fu user and do some research. I think you're on the right track as far as mega-dosing with live culture probiotics as a cure. I hope you'll read the article I posted about re-setting autoimmunity
Jayden Parker
Basically this.
You are supposed to only use the leftover yoghurt from the last batch for fermentation. Let it sit out in the open for some time to infect the shit out of it then use just that and nothing else. Believe me when I say that's the best way, a Turk taught me that and it works fucking wonders.
I have to say though, I don't have any bowel problems so not sure if that would work for you.
Jayden Kelly
>cant shit for 1.5 years >try every possible remedy. Spend hundreds of dollars >make probiotic yogurt with research behind it showing it helps with constipation >go back to normal >it's a placebo bro nice.
thank you for all of this. Will definitely read everything
I appreciate the suggestion but the best batch I've had was the one where it would have been impossible to use any leftover yogurt, i.e. the first one. So I don't think that's the problem.
Nathan Wright
>probiotic
The probiotic is the source of the contamination. lol The very definition of "probiotic" is LIVE bacteria and yeasts. you are infecting your yogurt with competing microbes.
Ryder Mitchell
catalog, ctrl+f 'chemistry,' and this is the only thread somewhat related to practical chemistry. I didn't want to make a new thread so...
Does anyone know if sieves can be used to dry already-made solutions of chemicals? I know they're magic for drying solvents, but just how "inert" are they? Specifically, I need to dry a solution of silver nitrate in acetonitrile.
