Colostrum - Kefir-Fermented

Colostrum is the first milk a newborn calf receives from its mother. Bovine colostrum is an ultimate food source with a unique composition, containing immunoglobulins, growth factors, interferons, interleukins, lactoferrin, amino acids, vitamins and minerals, among other things.

The unique composition of colostrum

Over the course of evolution, Mother Nature has given colostrum a true abundance of amazing substances. For newborns, it provides a good start in life. Beyond infancy, bovine colostrum as a food supplement provides valuable nutrients for young and old. There is hardly any other natural product that offers as many perfectly balanced and highly concentrated nutrients as colostrum.

Benefits of colostrum

• Contains immunoglobulins, PRPs (proline-rich polypeptides), lactoferrins, glycoproteins and cytokines
• Contains no antibiotics, fillers or hormones and is GMO-free
• Contains bioactive essential vitamins, minerals, enzymes and amino acids
• Colostrum is one of the richest food sources of antibodies
  

Bovine colostrum, a nutritious whole food that lives up to its name, has been studied in many areas. It is a complete food source so nutritious and complex that we can truly speak of a nutritional symphony: all its nutrients work together synergistically to create a collective whole. Bovine colostrum (also known as beestings) is very similar to human colostrum and shares many of the same components.

Colostrum 2.0 upgrade

Improving colostrum any further was not thought possible – until the qualities of kefir were added by fermenting the colostrum with enhanced kefir grains. The broad-spectrum microorganisms in the kefir culture act as tiny bioreactors and create many different compounds, including an abundance of bioactive peptides that are often unique to kefir. The original qualities of colostrum are preserved during fermentation, which makes fermented colostrum an extra special nutritional powerhouse.

Kefir-fermented colostrum: a quin-biotic supplement

High-quality, full-fat European colostrum with at least 20% immunoglobulins is fermented for 48 hours. Besides a specific starter culture, artisanal kefir grains from Romania are used to further enhance the process.

Once finished, the original colostrum has been transformed in composition. More than 300 new, unique bioactive peptides have formed, and a quin-biotic (five-component) supplement has been created. "Quin-biotic" is a new term for an all-in-one prebiotic, probiotic, paraprobiotic, postbiotic and probiotaceutical food supplement.

Mind you, this is not a lab-made formulation of individual, isolated compounds! Kefir-fermented colostrum is special not only because of the nutrients present in colostrum or the microorganisms in kefir. It is special precisely because they are cultured and transformed together. The symbiotic and synergistic interactions that occur during the fermentation phase fully realise the amazing potential for complexity in natural foods!

Prebiotic, probiotic, paraprobiotic, postbiotic and probiotaceutical: all-in-one

Prebiotic: the low-molecular-weight peptides (<3000 Da), as well as a varied selection of polysaccharides such as kefiran.

Probiotic: the following intact, live microorganisms: Lactobacillus spp. (L. acidophilus, L. kefiranum, L. kefir, L. parakefir, L. helveticus, L. delbrueckii – bulgaricus, L. casei), Saccharomyces spp., Lactococcus lactis and C. lipolytica. These diverse strains come from the complex and highly diverse traditional Romanian kefir grains, which reportedly contain a large number of CFUs and dozens of different species of bacteria and yeasts.

Paraprobiotic: inactivated microbial cells of probiotics. These are intact or ruptured cells containing cell components, ranging from peptidoglycans and teichoic acids to surface proteins and even crude cell extracts with complex chemical compositions.

Postbiotic: the short-chain fatty acids produced by the microorganisms during fermentation from, among other things, longer-chain fatty acids, as well as enzymes and biosurfactants.

Probiotaceutical: factors derived from probiotic microorganisms. These functional factors can be all kinds of biomolecules and metabolites, including peptides, but also indole derivatives and even bacteriocins such as reuterin, nisin and pediocin.

Additional compounds in colostrum

Besides bioactive peptides, hundreds of other biomolecules can be found in kefir-fermented colostrum. Important components include free amino acids, organic acids, vitamins, probiotic microorganisms, immunoglobulins, lactoferrin, transfer factors, growth factors, enzymes, cytokines, PRPs, antioxidants, endorphins, interleukins, interferons, telomerase, transferrin, biotin, L-carnitine, melatonin, insulin, lysozyme, C3, C4 and orosomucoid, α-1-fetoprotein, α-1-antitrypsin, macrophage-activating factors (MAFs), xanthine oxidase and lactoperoxidase.

The power of bioactive peptides

The fascinating properties of food peptides are increasingly being recognised. Many of the physiochemical roles of naturally occurring low-molecular-weight peptides are carried out by peptide sequences that are often encrypted within the parent protein. In science, bioactive peptides are defined as amino acid sequences, either as isolated structures or within a protein, that are known to have an effect on human body functions. This bioactivity goes beyond the well-known nutritional value of amino acids and proteins: bioactive peptides act as true messenger molecules.

Paleo-acceptable and approved!

Fermented foods and drinks very likely accompanied and eased the transition from hunter-gatherer communities to farming communities during the Neolithic revolution, around 14,000 years ago. In many traditional cultures they have remained a building block of the human diet ever since.

Our history with milk presents a chicken-or-egg puzzle. Humans could not digest the drink before they developed mutations that helped them do so – but they already had to be consuming milk for their DNA to change. "There has always been the question of what came first: the cultural practice or the mutation." There are indications that we were consuming milk before we had the genetic tools to digest it properly.

The evolution of fermented dairy

Based on the earliest cave paintings, it seems our ancestors had a symbiotic relationship with cattle for much longer. It is therefore very likely that occasional consumption of dairy, or even colostrum, was not unusual. Although dairy products are not part of the strictest versions of the paleo diet, fermented dairy is accepted and valued in less strict variations, or depending on personal tolerance. This is because such products almost form a food group of their own and differ considerably from unfermented dairy.

What makes fermented dairy different

Fermented dairy is fundamentally different from unfermented dairy. Fermentation turns ordinary dairy into a completely different product. Milk sugars are broken down and the milk is enriched in many ways. Unwanted and potentially problematic components of dairy are converted during the process and remain in the final product in small amounts or not at all. A relevant and well-known example is the milk sugar lactose. At the same time, fermentation increases complexity and nutrient density, as the kefir bacteria and yeasts produce additional nutrients. The result is a well-tolerated, richer product compared with unfermented dairy. A clear definition of fermentation could be: "nutritional enrichment through beneficial microbial growth and enzymatic conversion of food components".

A new concept

Kefir is considered the king of fermented foods, not only because it makes dairy easier to digest, but also because it offers unrivalled compositional complexity and nutrient density. For these reasons, we adopted the concept of kefir and applied it to our colostrum: the most fundamental form of food.

Kefir-fermented colostrum

• Kefir-fermented colostrum contains more than 65 times more low-molecular-weight peptides
• Kefir-fermented colostrum contains 4.6 times more natural fats
• Kefir-fermented colostrum contains 66 times less lactose (5.5 mg per capsule)