Who We Are | Yemoos Nourishing Cultures

Who is Yemoos? We are not a company, we don't outsource our work, in fact we don't even have any employees. We are simply a family who are fortunate to now live on a small farm in the beautiful rural countryside of west Michigan- along with a couple of wonderful four-legged members, many chickens, several thousand honey bees and of course a couple trillion happy little bacteria and yeast. I'm not sure who enjoys the kefirs, kombucha and home-made sourdough bread the most, but you can count on a lot of munching going on in our house between all of us! The website and images are also designed and created by us. As a family we enjoy being outdoors and being around animals as much as possible, whether its hiking, gardening, building or just enjoying our furry and feathered family members outside. We hope to be adding goats to our family soon as part of our journey from "city to country". We also love to spend time cooking our own food and creating our own skin care products for our family. We are always looking for ways to recycle, re-use and in general respect the planet we share by wasting as little as possible and using natural and earth-friendly products. Update: Due to the arrival of our new baby, we are currently back in Utah in order to be closer to family. We hope to return to the countryside and homesteading at some point in the near future.

How did it all start? It all started years ago when we were consuming lots of store-bought kefir for health purposes. It came to the point where we asked ourselves if that was really sustainable for us; the store bought kefir was so expensive and we were drinking so much that it was just eating a hole in our pocket. We had been making our own yogurt at home for some time, and wondered, is it possible to make kefir at home? After some time researching and sorting through a lot of the misinformation on the web, we found out that true traditional kefir can only be made at home with the help of the live grains. We were given some milk kefir grains locally by a wonderful woman who took the time to show us the process of how to make kefir and served us some fresh banana-strawberry kefir before leaving. We were amazed (and a little hesitant!) at these fascinating live little grains floating around in our jar of milk driving home. We began making our own kefir, which then led us to the other cultures, and we have not looked back! We knew that this was something that we wanted to share and pass on to anyone else also looking for a more sustainable, rewarding and health-promoting food.

Where did the name 'Yemoos' come from, anyways? Yemoos is a word that came to have special meaning to us over the years. When we first met, yemoos was a fun and comical word that evolved out of the combination of you-me and me-you - thus 'ye' and 'moo', or 'yemoo'. Cultures like kefir, kombucha and sourdough are all amazing symbiotic relationships of yeast and bacteria that together transform an ordinary food into an incredible food. In life, just as in fermented food, it is when we come together that the best things are created. We have also found that balance is crucial in ferments, just as in life. It's not all about the yeast or the bacteria, more importantly it is about both of them balancing together and off of each other. This could not be more true for life as well. We found that the word 'yemoos' really sums up this symbiotic, balanced nature of cultures, our outlook on life, and our wish to establish this same relationship of giving and supporting one other in life and in health between us, and you.

What do we want to do here? There was a time when we were both struggling with many health issues, understood little about health, and had many trials and errors in our quest to achieve some sort of health. In the end our greatest teacher was our first culture - our milk kefir, and listening to our own bodies. We cannot begin to say all the ways in which our cultures have changed our lives for the better. The crazy thing is that we may have gotten just as much benefit from what kefir has taught us about life as from the health benefits of consuming them, too! And we hope that this will be your experience, too. We simply want to provide others with the ability to enjoy and experience what we do each day with our cultures. Kefir, kombucha and sourdough all have rich histories of sharing. We want to share our knowledge and desire to help, as well as our cultures. But more importantly we want you to share with us too, so we can learn and grow together and ultimately help each other. We hope to be able to help anyone embarking on their journey into these life-enriching cultures, or health in general.

Why is there a cost for your cultures? You may ask, why do we charge for our cultures - isn't it a tradition to share and give these cultures away? While we would love to be able to offer all of them for free to everyone, we like to compare it to an 'adoption fee'. Putting a cost to the cultures covers the time and care we put into them daily, enables us to afford the best ingredients to ensure the best cultures (raw milk, whole cane sugar, organic tea, fresh home-ground flours). It also aids us in our on-going research and ability to share what we find with you here on this site. It also enables people from all around the world the opportunity to try these cultures, and encourages those who invest in a culture to take the time and effort to care for their cultures. We also enjoy sharing our cultures locally, giving away our cultures to our family, friends, and neighbors whenever we can.

What's so great about cultures? It may sound a little redundant with the trend towards sustainability and organic foods lately but there really is nothing like home made food. The lower cost, the better taste, the higher quality, the improvement in health, the time you share while making or eating it with your loved ones and the rewarding relationship between you and your food make it something more than worthwhile to try. In our current day of fast-paced lifestyles, processed foods and a disconnected society, these cultures give back to us a little bit of what is sorely lacking.

What are our goals? One thing these cultures teach is that you truly reap what you sow, and all good things take time and care. We hope that this site will also be a direct reflection of this belief. We want to continue to share and provide for you the same cultures and knowledge that have been shared with us, as well as our continued research we conduct. In our personal lives we are also always looking for ways to slow down, find balance and take in life as it is meant to be. We as a family are interested in a simple and sustainable lifestyle. We hope to share our journey with you as we learn how to live more balanced and simply (easier said then done!:)). If you'd like to followour journey (which has only just begun), please visit our photo album page.

We'd like to leave you with one last note that we hope you'll be comforted to know that whatever you may spend or donate here goes right back towards our land, our animals, our garden and ultimately our cultures, time, research and ability to give you our very best. You can observe more of who and what you are supporting in our Photo Album. We truly believe what goes around comes around. Just as in culturing, however much we share with others is what can be shared back, and then some.