I think(hoping) my reverse tolerance is gone.

[kl.Dukester]

Last night I had somewhat of a break through with finally feeling the effects, but it was so late at night that I was going to sleep no matter what I had ingested.
This evening I as preparing my Kava with a little more optimism, rather than looking at it like I was preparing another typical cup of dirty water.
I placed 2 heaping tablespoons of N@H's Stone into the prep cloth, and let it sit in a cup of water for a few minutes.  In the meantime I gathered some apple slices and grapes to mask the taste a little, and hyped myself up for the task at hand.
I downed 2 shells and took a little break.  Mouth is nice and tingled, so I went back for shells 3 and 4.  
It's been a few minutes, and I can honestly say that the effects far surpass anything that I have had so far.  In about 10 -20 I'm going to go back and finish the last of the shells.  Hopefully tonight is the night for getting krunk off the kava.

 

[kl.Dukester]

UPDATE: Went back for the last of the shells. Another disappointing night to say the least.



I will look for the soy lechtin tomorrow, but from what I've been reading, not including it shouldn't be a deal breaker in the kava.



Hopefully the RT goes away fast, because the taste isn't making this any easier. At least the stone is better than the Fu'u. I was almost ready to toss or give away the Fu'u because of the taste.

 

[Ed!]

Funny how taste is. I think Fu'u is easy drinking... like, the easiest I've had. I love me some Stone, but I think it's the only kava that's made me barf.



Keep trying. It took me a month to get past.

 

[kl.new2kava]

One thing I can see you may stop is eating with kava. Drink kava on an empty stomach and don't have any caffeine in your system. If the taste is too much to take use coconut water or even chocolate almond milk. I use 50/50 coconut water and soy lectin and never drink when I've eaten within 4 hours. I thought fu'u was pretty mild and creamy tasting and always considered stone to be more pungent and brutal. If you have trouble with the taste you will definatly want to steer clear of chiefs as that stuff has a really strong taste, somewhere between super strong kava taste and biting into a green pine cone.

 

[kl.Dukester]

It's not so much the taste as it is the texture of murky water.  Fu'u has a strange taste though, but again, I think it has more to do with the texture and smell than the taste.
Will all that being said, I'm sure if I was over the RT time, then I wouldn't give a crap about any texture or the taste.  
I read an older post on some thoughts to speed up the RT.  At the moment I am soaking some Fu'u in water for about 30 minutes.  After that I am just going to down that motherfooking thing like a champ, and hopefully I will be all smiles.
Again, thanks for your thoughts and opinions on the matter.

 

[Ed!]

Some have also mentioned kava candy as a between shells life-saver. That might be an option that even enhances the effect.



Definitely try with different liquids as new2 was saying. I've done coconut water, almond milk, chocolate almond milk, unsweetened grapefruit juice, pomegranate juice and others. Different ones have paired better with different kavas to me.... the grapefruit juice was great with Fu'u for example, but I wasn't digging it with Stone.

 

[Ed!]

One thing I've done for texture (because I'll just mix and chug sometimes... with Fu'u specifically) is drink it through a straw. I get more down faster that way.

 

[kl.Dukester]

A spoonfull of sugar (or 2) helped the medicine go down. It's a few minutes later, and I can slowly feel a little warmth and smile coming over my face (wow, that didn't sound too good).



I'm going to assume that the impatience of being a noob has been by biggest enemy. letting the root soak for a good 30+ minutes before doing anything else to it really worked this time. All the other times I have been putting the root in the bag, letting it soak for about 5 minutes, and then pressing and soaking for about 10 more minutes.



I will have to buy some different drinks to try and find what I like best. I know I can get used to the taste, but I can imagine it being hard trying to bring friends into the cult of kava by just handing them a shell full of murky water.

 

[kl.snwrist]

Stick with it. It took me about a month and a half to beat reverse tolerance. It's a bitch, but so worth it once you get over that hurdle.

 

[kl.NDG]

soak it over night dude. I find soaking longer makes for an easy extraction, I never kneed I simply shake in a shaker bottle after several hours of soaking. Also, try first thing in the morning, no food, thats a true test.

 

[krunkedout]

I agree with NDG on the soaking. I start making my kava in the morning and soak it all day until i knead it in the evening (between 5:30 and 8:30) and also I make sure I havnt eaten anything since around 2:30 usually at the latest. But I find especially with course ground kava that soaking makes a big difference and makes it easier to knead. I knead for sometimes a half hour, but that's mostly because I find that sort of relaxing and almost ritualistic.