Kefir

[Victor Steinbok]

[First, I want to note that I am greatly disappointed in the new Google
Books format. The size of the visible page has shrunk, in order to give
more room to the buttons and incidentals; the amount of useful
information has also been shrunk--and will require several clicks to
recover; and, there is no longer a built-in mechanism for reporting
missing or damaged pages.]

kefir: 1884 --> 1814

OK, looking at the citations:

> 1884 /Nature/ 3 July 216/2 Kephir has only been generally known even
> in Russia for about two years.
> 1894 /Lancet/ 3 Nov. 1072 Koumiss and kefyr and examples of sour
> fermented milk containing an excess of carbonic acid gas.

It seems the definition came from the second one. Bleah! And the first
one may well be quite inaccurate--wildly so.

http://goo.gl/QvjWU
Travels in the Caucasus and Georgia: performed in the years 1806 and
1808, by Command of the Russian Government. By Julius von Klaproth.
Translated from the German by G. Shoberl. 1814
Chapter 24. Tatar Tribes in the Caucasus. p. 288
http://goo.gl/qOgC0
The Annual Register; Or a View of the History, Politics, and Literature,
For the Year 1814. Volume 56. London: 1815.
The Ckaratschai. (From Travels in the Caucasus and Georgia) p. 480/1-2
> They sell to foreign traders the skins of bears, hares, foxes, and
> martens; but those of the wild goats they keep for themselves, and use
> them for carpets, which they lay upon the spot where they kneel during
> prayer. They likewise make boot-legs and Tartar boots of them, and cut
> them into small strips to sew with. They keep many sheep, asses, mules
> /(ckadra), /and horses, which last, though small, are strong and
> spirited, and admirably adapted for travelling in the mountains. Their
> butter is excellent, and with the milk they make very good cheese
> /(bischlik). /A very common dish with them is /kefir/; so also is
> boiled mutton /(schisslick), /or meat roasted upon small sticks, or
> cakes filled with minced meat and other things. Their beer /(ssra)
> /is, like that of the Ossetes, the best in the Caucasus, and resembles
> English porter. They distil brandy from barley and wheat, arid their
> bread they commonly bake in the ashes. They are very fond of tobacco,
> which they cultivate themselves; and there are several species of it,
> all of which are in great request. They sell it to the Nogays,
> Ssuanes, and Jews; these last export it to the Kabardah and to Russia.

I included the entire stretch to show that "kefir" is the only local
term that's been integrated into the text. In fact, looking at a couple
of pages on either side confirms that--there are a couple of places
where you have "They are called X", but other than that, all local terms
are translations, placed in parenthesis.

On the original identification of "kefir" with "koumiss", consider this
1890 source:

http://goo.gl/kMTKs
Food in health and disease. By Isaac Burney Yeo. Philadelphia: 1890
Part I. Chapter 3. p. 63
> Koumiss.--Milk can be made to undergo alcoholic fermentation by the
> conversion of its lactose into alcohol and carbonic acid.
> Advantage has been taken of this property in certain countries to
> produce an alcoholic drink from milk. The Kirghis tribes and the
> Tartars, who dwell in the immense plains surrounding the Caspian Sea,
> utilise mare's milk for this purpose, and prepare from it an alcoholic
> beverage which is known as koumiss. There are two or three qualities
> prepared of varying strength.
> ...
> A form of koumiss is also prepared in England from cow's milk.
> ...
> Kefyr is another fermented drink, prepared in the mountains of the
> Caucasus from cow's milk. This fermentation is brought about through
> the agency of a microorganism, the /Dispora caucasica, /which is added
> to the milk, and it possesses the property of converting the lactose
> into alcohol and carbonic acid.
> As cow's milk contains proportionately much less sugar than mare's
> milk, /kefyr /therefore contains less alcohol than koumiss.

Part I. Chapter 11. pp. 313-6
> Recently, in America especially, /Kefir, /the productof fermentation
> of cow's or goat's milk, has been highly extolled as a substitute for
> mother's milk. It is manufactured like koumiss, and has been used for
> ages in the Caucasus.
> The kefir ferment contains three varieties of bacteria--bacillus
> caucasius, b. lactus, and saccharomyces mycoderma.
> Good kefir is rather thick, of uniform consistence, and free from
> lumps; it contains more or less carbonic acid gas, which forms bubbles
> on the surface; it has a sour taste, but is less acid than
> butter-milk, which it resembles. It contains less casein and milksugar
> than fresh cow's milk; while alcohol (5 to 15 in 1,000), lactic acid,
> hemi-albumen, lacto-syntonin, and peptones are found as the result of
> fermentation. As the fermentation goes on more of the casein is
> digested, and the conversion of this sugar-of-milk into alcohol,
> carbonic acid gas, and lactic acid continues. The remaining casein is
> precipitated in fine flakes, the size of which is not increased by the
> action of the gastric juice.
> Kefir is a partially-digested milk, and is believed to fulfil an
> important indication in infant feeding--viz. the breaking up of the
> curd of cow's milk without introducing indigestible matter into the
> infant's stomach.
> ...
> In kefir we have the soluble forms of albumen due to the action of the
> ferment, and consequently the light, flocculent coagulation.
> "Theoretically, then, we should have in kefir one of the very best
> foods for infants, if lactic acid, carbonic acid gas, and alcohol are
> not counter-indications. Lactic acid is found in the stomach in the
> normal digestion of the sugar of milk, and its presence can but assist
> in the digestion of the casein. Carbonic acid gas rather increases the
> secretion of the glands, and alcohol in a dilute solution is a tonic,
> and stimulates digestion and nutrition."
> * This account of kefir has been taken from the article on "Dietetics
> of Infancy and Childhood" in Sajous' "Annual of the Universal Medical
> Sciences," 1889. Some of the conclusions arrived at herein have been
> vigorously contested, and some physicians regard lactic acid as a
> dangerous substance in food.

On possibility is that both kumys and kefir available in the West have
evolved significantly since the 1890s. Of course, Yeo suggested that
"koumiss" was being used to treat tuberculosis, but even he was somewhat
skeptical of this claim. He then follows up with another great revelation:

Part 2. Chapter 9. p. 535
> Artificial koumiss is prepared in England by the Aylesbury and other
> dairy companies.
> The koumiss cure has been well and briefly defined as "essentially
> nothing more than a high nutrition of the sick."

Right.

http://goo.gl/2aZHV
Scientific American. July 28, 1883
Kefir. p. 50/1

and similar [text follows the Monthly Magazine, while SciAm credits
"British Medical Journal"]

http://goo.gl/Swdxm
The Monthly Magazine of Pharmacy, Chemistry, &c. London: October, 1883
Kefir. p. 957/2
> It is now some years since koumiss has been introduced into Western
> Europe and even into America, and whilst that has occurred a new drink
> prepared from cow's milk, and known as "kefir," has sprung up in Russia.
> This fluid has long formed the chief article of diet among the
> mountaineers in the neighbourhood of Mount Elbruz and Kasbek in the
> Caucasus. It forms a thick white liquor, with a faintly acid flavour,
> said to resemble certain light wines. The popular name for it is
> "ghippo," but the Russians call it kefir or khiafar, and they make use
> of it not as a beverage but as a medicine.
> Kefir is a popular remedy with them for anaemia, struma, gastric
> catarrh, and chronic bronchitis.
> Dr. Kern has written an article upon this product in the /Medical
> Gazette, /of Moscow, in which we find that the preparation of the
> liquor is not very difficult. The peasants make it by filling a bag
> made of goat skin with milk, then a tenacious mass about the size of a
> walnut, of a material they call " kefir seed," and the precise origin
> of which is unknown, is added to the milk.
> In a few hours the whole is in active fermentation ; and this is
> allowed to, continue for three days.
> The peasants keep the nature of the ferment, the "kefir seed," a
> profound secret--it is impossible to induce them to make known whence
> they obtain it : so extremely reticent are they, in this respect, that
> we are rather inclined to think they are ashamed of the manner in
> which they procure it. Dr. Kern has examined it under the microscope.
> It forms dark brown earth-like masses quite dry. One of them dropped
> into milk begins rapidly to effervesce, turns milk-white and assumes
> the form of a mulberry, then fermentation proceeds at once.
> If a piece of kefir seed thus transformed be dropped into another bowl
> of milk, it rapidly increases in size and also causes it to ferment.
> The brown earth-like dry fragments appear to consist of fungoid masses
> of "zooplcea holding together collections of a bacterium, a species
> of/Dispora, /with which the common yeast fungus is constantly found
> associated. Kefir seed retains its activity as a ferment after
> remaining for months in a dry condition. Dr. Kern is of opinion that
> kefir and koumiss are equally valuable.

http://goo.gl/9uYMs
Transactions of the Institute of Brewing. Sixth Session. 1891-92. Vol. 5
(3). London: January 1892.
Symbiosis and Symbiotic Fermentation. By Marshall Ward. p. 70
> Now I want to pass to a class of facts which are even newer. A few
> years ago, in examining a remarkable substance known as Kephir, in the
> Caucausus, Kern found that the drink known as Kephir was formed by the
> inhabitants of the Caucausus putting into milk certain substances
> which they call Kephir grains. These Kephir grains, as I dare say most
> of you know, are yellowish-brown masses of a horny nature when dry,
> which swell up into a jelly-like consistency when wet. In the jelly
> are found several organisms, particularly certain rod-like bacteria
> and certain yeasts. Kern, who could hardly be expected at that time to
> have made quite so close a study of these forms, because points now
> familiar to all of us had not then been raised, established that there
> was present a yeast, which he thought was the common /Saccharomyces
> cerevisiae. /It was found that if you put the Kephir grains into the
> milk it began to show signs of fermentation, and soon abounded in
> lactic acid ; that then the yeast began to break up certain
> constituents of the milk, the sugar, and the bacterium began to
> peptonize certain other constituents of the milk, and between them
> they set up a complex series of fermentation changes, which resolved
> the milkinto an effervescing fluid known as Kephir, large quantities
> of carbonic acid, and traces of alcohol being produced. From a recent
> publication by Mix, who has examined a Kephir-like organism in
> America, there is no doubt that Kern s yeast is a totally different
> one from the one now to be described, and everything about the
> Schizomycete is different. Of late years there has come to our
> knowledge another example, which is, perhaps, more remarkable even
> than this.

p. 79
> With regard to Kefir, about which Professor Ward spoke, I would ask
> him, I think it is De Bary who mentions it, whether Levy, of Hagenau,
> was not able to produce exactly the same Kefir without using any Kefir
> grains at all, by simply shaking the milk at the time that it was
> turning sour; and under these circumstances, as I do not think that
> these experiments have ever been denied, I would like to know whether
> Levy's observations clash in any way with the statements of Professor
> Ward respecting Kefir.

http://goo.gl/3wvKn
Nature. May 11, 1882.
Caucasian Milk Ferment. p. 43/1
> The inhabitants of the high-lying lands in the Caucasus prepare, by
> fermentation of cows' milk, a drink which they call kephir. Kephir is
> used by the inhabitants of the mountains not only as an article of
> food, but also as a remedy against different diseases. As a ferment in
> the preparation of this drink, strange white lumps are used, which
> have a spherical or elliptical shape, and attain the size of from 1 m.
> to 5 cm. On a microscopical examination of these lumps, they showed
> that they consisted of two different substances--yeast cells and
> bacteria. The yeast cells may be regarded as the ordinary form,
> produced by cultivation, of /Saccharomyces cerevisiae, /but Kem was
> unable to get these to the spore-bearing stage. As to the bacteria,
> they composed the chief part of the little lumps, and were in the
> Zoogloea state. The vegetative bacteria cells were 3.2 m. to 8 m. in
> length, and .8 broad. In preparations put up by drying, a distinct
> cell membrane could be distinguished. Treated after Koch's method, the
> vegetative cells show at one end a locomotive organ, which resembles a
> cat-and-nine-tails, of threads. When exposed to the action of acids or
> a high temperature, the vegetative-cells grow out [probably through
> progressive cell-divisions] into long Leptothrix threads, which change
> generally precedes the spore-formation stage. The spores are round,
> always formed in twos in each vegetable cell, and are always placed
> standing on their ends; even by making use of Hartnack's immersion X,
> no parti'ion wall could bedi-covered between the spores. In the
> Leptothrix-threads rows of spores could be observed, which are,
> however, always so situated that two spores belong to each cell. The
> spores while still in the cells are .8 m. in size; those lying free
> attain the size of 1 m.; the germinating spares swell up 1.6 m. The
> germination of the spores generally takes place in such a manner that
> an exo;porium and an endosporium can always be distinguished in them.
> The thinner endosporium arises out of the thicker exosporium, first as
> a small excrescence, which gradually increases, developing more and
> more into a long cylindrical tube, and then begins by celldivision to
> form vegetative cells. The whole course of the development to the
> spore-formation, beginning with the vegetative cell t o the formation
> of a similar new cell, was followed. This newly described form of
> Bacteria, which undoubtedly b:longs to the Desmobacteria of Cohn, is
> in its vegetative state not unlike the /Bacillus subtilis /of Cohn; it
> is, however, clearly distinguished not only from it, but also from all
> other kinds of Bacteria hitherto described by its spore-formation,
> since it always forms in each cell two round spores placed end to end,
> while in the species of Bacteria hitherto described, only one spore
> has been noticed in each cell. On account of this sbarply-marked
> feature Kern places this form of Bacteria in a new genus, next to
> the genus Bacillus, and calls it /Dispora caucasica, /nov. g. et nov.
> sp. A more exhaustive essay on this subject, with explanatory plates
> Kern promises in the next number of the /Bulletin de la Societe
> Imperial des Naturalistes de Moscow./—Prof. Dr. J. N. Goroschankin
> assisted Kern by kindly furnishing him with the necessary materials
> for his work, for which Kern expresses his deejest thanks—/Botanische
> Zeitung, /April 21, 1882, p. 264.

It appears that Edward Kern discovered kefir just in time for various
health-cure fads of the 1890s-1910s--yet another snake oil that passed
into history until fairly recently. Koumiss followed the same
development, but appeared a bit sooner and vanished faster (horse milk
just could not compete with cow milk). Yet, there was enough influence
left, apparently, to sway the N.E.D. editors.

VS-)


On 12/14/2011 12:26 PM, Benjamin Barrett wrote:
> The OED definition of "kefir" needs updating. It says:
>
> -----
> An effervescent liquor resembling koumiss, prepared from milk which has been fermented; employed as a medicine or food for invalids.
> -----
> ...

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