That's wine in the jar. It has to be close to a year ago when I thought I'd just let a bottle of red wine go sour, thereby making red wine vinegar, right? I started by leaving the top off when I thought of it. That didn't do anything, so then I just left it off completely. For weeks and weeks. Bugs may have fallen in; I didn't check - the bottle was painted black. But it still smelled like wine after all that time. I got an idea that maybe sunlight would make it happen, so I poured it into a clear jar. That was quite a while ago and it still smells like wine. Today I found this which seems to say it's not that simple. So, I give up. I could swear that during my youth, there was once some wine in our house that went bad.
Maybe they're making it differently now; kind of like the ultra-pasteurized cream that two months after you bought it is still (miraculously) good.
Very interesting, Lisa!
ReplyDeletewell then, how about that......
ReplyDeleteI've been trying to make apple cider vinegar. We press our own cider and so I thought, why not? I've got enough to experiment with. But, it must have been too sweet because even months and months and months later its still not tangy enough. I kept it in the dark, open, but covered with cheese cloth. I was even following directions from a book! Still, no vinegar. Oh well, not all experiments are destined to be triumphs, I guess.
ReplyDeleteThere is also mention of a "mother" in the making of vinegar, as in kombucha. I don't know why some vinegars would need it, and others not.
DeleteI put some of the mother from a (purchased) jar of raw apple cider vinegar in with our apple cider....it didn't take, I guess. I don't know. Trial and error. This one being more error for me than anything else, but...
DeleteWas it hard cider, Beth, or regular? I guess you're supposed to put something with alcohol content in it.
DeleteIt was just straight pressed apples--non alcoholic, and very sweet. The (brief) instructions I was following made no mention of anything alcholic/fermented--aside from using a raw ACV with a mother. We've had bottles of Bragg's get quite a little patty at the bottom, though I think it wasn't quite so thick in the bottle I used. I saved the bottom few inches of our last bottle of Bragg's ACV because it had such a thick mother patty in there. That is what I'll use for trial two, I think.
DeleteGood luck with it!
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