102 PEOCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 



IX. 



ON A KEPHIR-LIKE YEAST FOUND IN THE 

 UNITED STATES. 



By Charles L. Mix. 



Presented by Professor W. Q. Farlow, May 26, 1S91. 



A SPECIES of 3'east which causes alcoholic fermeutation of n)ilk is 

 well known in Europe, the attention of the leading scientists having 

 been called to it by Edouard Kern, in an article published during 

 November, 1881, and entitled, " Ueber ein neues Milch-ferment aus 

 dem Kaukasus." In order to give an intelligible description of a 

 similar ferment which exists in the United States, a summary of 

 Kern's paper becomes a necessity. 



Kern's milk-ferment is found in the region of the Caucasus Moun- 

 ta'ns, and so far as is known in no other j)lace. It is called by the 

 Caucasian peasants "kephir," "kiphir," "kiaphir," or "kefir." The 

 country being a mountainous one, agriculture is impossible, so that 

 milk and flesh are the food of the peasants. However, they do not 

 drink their milk fresh, but ferment it, adding to it what are known 

 as " kephir-graiiis " in the proportion of one volume of the grains to 

 six or seven volumes of milk. The whole is then exposed to the air 

 for twenty-four hours at an ordinary temperature, and shaken fre- 

 quently. The '' ferment-milk " thus formed is poured from the grains 

 and mixed with twice its volume of fresh milk, which it ferments in 

 turn, eliminating a large amount of carbonic acid gas, and forming 

 from ?, % to 1% of alcohol. When kephir is made successfully, it 

 is a thick fluid without any very large coagulated dumps, and with a 

 pleasantly acid taste ; by longer fermentation it becomes a frothing, 

 foaming, strongly acid drink, like the koumiss of the Steppes. 



According to Kern, this ferment is used not onlv as a driidv, but 

 also as a curative for various diseases, with great success, various 

 gastric and ])ulmonary complaints, it is said, being cuied by it. Its 

 reputation, Kern continues, has extended beyond tlie narrow limits 

 of the mountainous region where it originated, and has already 

 reached many cities of the Caucasian district. 



