Episode 33 - Fruit Kefir for Puppies: Double the Ferment, Many Times the Benefits

10/28/2025

This episode’s question is about giving puppies double fermented fruit kefir:

"Hello, We are curious about the benefits of using Mango kefir for puppies. How does it help their gut flora? What is the purpose of using it. Thanks!"

Listen in as I discuss:

Why kefir in general is such a probiotic powerhouse
How a second ferment with fruit transforms the nutritional profile and bioavailability of kefir
Why double fermented fruit kefir is particularly appropriate for puppies

Listen wherever you get your podcasts, and subscribe so you never miss an episode!

To read the transcript for this episode, click the link below.

Transcript - Episode 33

I'm Jane Messineo Lindquist, and this is a Puppy Culture Potluck podcast. You bring the topics, we bring the discussion.

This episode's question is about mango kefir. And here it is.

Hello. We're curious about the benefits of using mango kefir for puppies. How does it help their gut flora? What is the purpose of using it? Thanks.

Okay. Me again. Well, this is a little bit of an open ended question, but I'm going to take it this way. She's asking generally, what is the advantage of a kefir over other kinds of fermented dairy, and specifically why you would add fruit to a kefir and what the advantages of that are. So here goes.

Let me just start by giving you a background, in case you're not familiar of how kefir is made. Kefir is made by putting something called kefir grains into milk and leaving it on a counter. You just leave it on the counter. You don't prepare the milk in any way. You just take those kefir grains, put them in the milk, cover it, put it on a counter. Now those kefir grains are kind of scoby, which stands for a symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast. And those grains look like little clumps of yellowish cottage cheese.

And if you touch them, they have a gelatinous, almost rubbery quality to them. But what's important to this conversation about those that scoby those, those grains is that, oh, compared to other kinds of fermented dairy, kefir has this crazy powerhouse level of probiotics. And it's because of this scoby. It's because of these grains. Yogurt, for instance, naturally contains between 2 and 6 probiotic strains, whereas kefir contains 50 or more strains of probiotics.

Kefir also has beneficial yeasts, which yogurt does not have. So just your ordinary milk kefir is a tremendously beneficial probiotic food for dogs or for you. Now let's talk about the specific advantages of doing a double fermented fruit kefir, such as a mango kefir. Because when she talks about that mango kefir that she's asking about, that is from our breeder course, where that's what we feed our puppies is a double fermented kefir.

It's not a carrier that you've just ground up fruit, and added that, it goes through a whole second ferment. Let me explain. So you've taken your kefir grains. You've put them in the milk, you've left it on the counter for a day at room temperature, and you've got some nice milk kefir. Now you remove those kefir grains, you take them out from the kefir and you blitz that kefir with some fruit.

So you puree that in a blender. In this example it's mango. But there are lots of other fruits you can use peach, blueberry, strawberry. These are all ones that I have in regular rotation at my house. You take that fruit kefir blend, you cover it, put it on your counter for another 24 hours. And now it goes to a second ferment.

When you do this second ferment with fruit, which in this case is mango, the mango brings a bunch of nutritional value in and of itself. So there's additional vitamins and nutritional value that you're adding just by adding fruit in. But in addition to that, the mango is bringing prebiotics into the mix. What are prebiotics? Prebiotics are things that probiotics eat.

Probiotics are living things, and they need food to survive. So when you introduce prebiotics into the mix, the probiotics that are in the kefir, now, they have a smorgasbord and they're just going to chow down on those prebiotics that you've introduced. And they multiply like mad. So fruit kefir is much more probiotic dense than milk kefir. And speaking of prebiotics, the fiber in the mango kefir is also going to bring prebiotics into your dog's gut.

And whatever beneficial probiotics are colonized there in the gut already are going to again feast and multiply on these prebiotics that you're introducing with the mango kefir. So the mango is feeding and increasing the probiotics in the drink itself, as well as in your dog's gut.

In addition to that, the vitamins that are already in the fruit and in the kefir are boosted. B vitamins, in particular get a big boost, and minerals such as magnesium and calcium become much more bioavailable with the second ferment. So it's truly a case where the whole is more than the sum of the parts. Now, the specific question was about the advantages of double fermented fruit kefir or so I'm making it sound like mango kefir is the Luke Skywalker of fermented dairy.

But the truth is that yogurt, milk, kefir and double fermented fruit kefir all three have some unique nutritional advantages over the others, and all three deserve a place in your dog's meal rotation.

Moving on to puppies. Specifically for puppies, mango or any fruit, kefir is a way of incorporating fruit into their diet in a more digestible form. This is really true of any dog or any human for that matter.

Fruit is more digestible and the nutrients in the fruit are more bio available when the fruit has been somewhat broken down by the fermentation process. But for puppies, it's true in a higher degree, because especially when they're first being introduced to fruit, their guts just can't break it down very effectively. When you ferment that fruit in kefir it's sort of pre digests the fruit and the puppies can absorb much more nutrients from it.

It is more like the way they might get it in real life at first, which would be regurgitated by an adult. So partially pre digested. The fermentation breaks down sugars. It creates enzymes and generally makes the fruit easier to digest while also increasing nutrient bioavailability. You know regurgitated fruit would also have enzymes from the adult stomach. So that would help break down the fruit.

And the sugars and other substances in the fruit would be broken down to some extent. So fermenting is just a way of presenting fruit to the puppies in something more approximating the way they might naturally have gotten it first in the wild. So to sum it up, mango, kefir or any fruit double ferment kefir is a probiotic boost, a prebiotic boost, a nutritional boost both in content and in bioavailability.

The fermenting breaks down the fruit into a more digestible form and introduces beneficial enzymes. A great starter food for young puppies. Fantastic for puppies or humans of any age.

If you liked this podcast, you'll love our bundles. We have bundles for breeders, bundles for puppy owners, show puppy bundles, pet puppy bundles. Check them all out at puppyculture.com.

Well, that's it for this time. Thanks for listening. Bye bye.