It’s Monday which means you either spent the last 48 hours in a desert dressed like a slutty homeless person, becoming one with the music or you just spent the last 48 hours crying over Snapchat watching other people party it up in the desert and wishing your were that slutty homeless person becoming one with the music. Either way I’m sure your body is like, one Chainsmokers song away from giving out completely. And like, it’s hard work living your best Instagram life surviving festival season. We need to take care of ourselves, girls. And what better way to rejuvenate our bodies than by drinking more?? *breaks out into cold sweats*
Because I don’t treat my body like a temple—if anything, more like a PF Chang’s, or more accurately, the back alley behind a PF Chang’s—I try and get my daily dose of health the only way I know how: through drinking the latest fad diet drinks. I’ve already told you about how I would gladly become a side-piece to the man who invented Dirty Lemon, aka the drink that lets you drink yourself pretty, but kombucha might be giving him a run for his money.
And if you’re sitting there thinking, like, WTF is kombucha? I knew there would be at least one of you. Kombucha is a concoction of bacteria, tea, and sugar that we’re supposed to pretend is V good for us when really we only love it because it looks good AF in our Instagram photos.
But people are always trying to bring me down by using “facts” and “science” as an argument for why I can’t just reset my body by taking the easy way out. So because I love proving people wrong (Hi, Mom), I decided I would take it upon myself to get to the bottom of this kombucha discussion. Is it actually good for me or am I just drinking mold for nothing? Here’s what we know:
THE BAD
Apparently aside from being trendy AF kombucha also has alcohol in it. Hmm I knew I tasted something I liked. After all, kombucha is a fermented drink and depending on how long it’s fermented for it can contain between .5 and 3 percent of alcohol, which some are claiming can have long-term adverse side effects on your body. I’m convinced that the only reason people are saying this is a “bad thing” is because the Cady Herons of the world don’t want us to have nice things and are trying to tarnish kombucha’s good name.
Sure, Jan.
So what you’re saying is that we can get low-grade fucked up in public and no one can say shit because we’re technically drinking tea? And this is a bad thing because?? Tbh if you can’t handle .5 to 3 percent of alcohol in your beverage then you shouldn’t be sitting with us in the first place. That’s, like, less than a shot and doesn’t even come close to the amount of Bailey’s that frequents my coffee most mornings. Grow the fuck up and drink like an adult.
THE GOOD
So moving on to the positives (though it’s still unclear as to what the negatives were here…), the ingredients found in kombucha are actually super good for your skin. Through the natural fermentation process, it’s naturally enriched with highly beneficial vitamins such as B1, B2, B3, and B12, as well as a ton of repairing acids. Beauty products with kombucha as their main ingredient have been proven to lighten, brighten, smooth, repair, plump, and protect skin. So if you’re struggling with, say, uneven skin tone, dark spots, hyperpigmentation and/or sagging skin then it’s either a really hard Monday or you just got back from Coachella. Either way kombucha enriched beauty products are literally designed to fix those issues. And they say we can’t have it all.
FINAL VERDICT
So just to recap here, not only will this make me look healthy on my Instagram story, but kombucha will also make me, like, really pretty and I get to drink alcohol in the process? As if I needed one more reason to flirt with hipsters visit a Whole Foods.