How do you get one of these things going?
Got my kefir grains,so I may get that started too. Maybe Ill post some pics in the Milk thread.
So, interesting afternoon. I set out to bottle my long aging cider. I made a point to age it for a long time. It is made of fresh pressed cider from the orchard. Through a mix up I ended up using a Belgian ale yeast. Over the past two or more years I have gone down to sniff test it maybe twice.It smelled wonderful both times. I intentionally put it on a back shelf in the basement to forget about it.
It had a bubbler type ferm.lock on it but I switched to some seran wrap and rubber bands for aging so I didn’t have to keep checking it. Maybe that was a bad idea?
Now the funny part, I got some vinegar with mother to make some vinegar. I go down in the basement to siphon off a few bottles of cider for conversion. I give a sniff and wow. Five gallons of cider vinegar.
Where did I go wrong? Or is that where did I go right?
Looks like a giant blob of a mother floating at the bottom too, I think? Ill post picks after I bottle some up.
Funny.
I’m guessing the acetobacter were present on the apples to begin with. If you had bottled it and drank it or just kept it colder you might never have noticed, but given the long time it spent aging at cellar temps and the plastic wrap allowing air to enter, it allowed the acetobacter to go to work.
That’s just a guess. But at least now you have some cider vinegar ;D
Wow.I have a carboy of beer that is next to the cider that is vinegar too. Or well on its way to be. WTF.
Looks like I have five gallons of cider vinegar and five gallons of beer vinegar. I better make a lot of fish and chips soon.
Guess I killed the vinegar making hobby. Any one want any vinegar? :
I still want to make some peach vinegar, and tomato vinegar.
I think a lot of the fruit vinegars are made from their sugar without being converted to alcohol first.
Here is some good vinegar info.
Bummer. Vinegar is a great weed killer on a sunny day, just mix it with some liquid dish soap and spray it on. It will kill the leaves in a short amount of time, depending on the sun. :-\
My wife let me buy some future vinegar crocks while shopping for a wedding shower at bed bath beyond…
One will be cider vingear and the other will be red wine vinegar. Now just gotta get some hard cider and wine in there. They are one gallon in volume.
Unless you break out the acid tester I wouldn’t use it for preservation over the long haul (Pickles and such) unless you know the actual % acid it can be dangerous (botulism etc.) other than that sounds yum.
Those look great, and a good size too. Nice grab.
I just plan on using it for marinades and salad dressing and stuff. 
Same, and maybe throwing some in flip top bottles to give away to friends/family for the same purpose.
I’ve got a batch of crabapple cider brewing right now. When it’s done I’ll buy some WalMart apple juice, pour it onto the yeast cake and then turn it into cider vinegar.
so here’s a thought I just had for the cider vinegar.
say I ferment in my jars I just got, then pitch the vinegar ‘mother’ and everything turns nicely. Is the yeast in there from initial fermentation any good? Reason being, I’m wondering if you could then just add plain apple juice to top things up and still get fermentation and then conversion to acetic acid.
???
I don’t think that would work at all but maybe somebody else will tell you it will work.
It probably depends on how long it’s been sitting. Chronological aging of yeast (which is its ability to re-enter the cell cycle after a period of no-growth) is affected to a large extent by pH and specifically acetic acid. Some friends of mine proved it quite nicely.
Keep in mind, the concentration of acetic acid in their experiments is much lower than you’ll find in your vinegar. They didn’t do any tests at that level of acidity, or in cider, or with wild yeasts, so their finding may not apply to your case.
interesting. thanks for the blurb on that tom. Based on that, I would have to believe that it wouldn’t work. Acidity would probably be around 5.5%. That probably wouldn’t bode well for the little critters.