WELL AND TRUE

Try as I might, I can’t avert my eyes from the thick, viscous skin floating at the top of a large glass jar right next to me. It looks like it could almost have a pulse it is so vital and alive. It seems incongruous to its surroundings – a sleek delicatessen space with an industrial-chic-meets-island-style vibe – but as I survey the shelves stacked with organic grains, probiotic yoghurt and freshly baked gluten-free bread, I find that it is actually archetypical.

It turns out that the jelly-like skin, known as scoby, is the (good) bacteria-packed essential building block of kombucha, the insanely