SC - Eggs graven with Vinegar

[CorwynWdwd at aol.com]

In a message dated 5/16/2000 12:05:46 AM Eastern Daylight Time, 
morgancain at earthlink.net writes:

> Probably they could not figure out how necessarily it happened. 

They knew how it happened, they just couldn't stop it. Neither can we without 
stringent sanitation, which is why you have a pickle crock and a brewing 
crock and never the twain will meet if you're smart. Some people don't even 
have their vinegar mother working in the same room as their wines and beer, 
and some people won't have it in their house at all.

> I know there is "mother of vinegar" which may be one of those bacterial 
clumps,
>  used to start the vinegar.  And my Etymological OED version talks of 
vinegar
>  as being produced by a form of fermentation ("acetous").

Vinegar can be made from any dilute alcohol, which makes wine and beer ideal 
for the purpose. we keep the vessels we make said potables in sealed to 
prevent contamination form the air and fruit fly like creatures we refer to 
as "vinegar flies" from getting to our brew and infecting it with acetic acid 
bacteria.

I too have seen numerous recipes on how to use wine or beer that has gone to 
vinegar, which is a completely natural process. I too will be looking for 
examples shortly. Don't expect it quickly though, lots of other projects in 
the offing.

Yes, sometimes it turned to something vile, but like people who can make 
sourdough bread easily in their own kitchen, there are some people who have 
the requisite bacteria present in their own homes to make vinegar. If they 
take up home brewing then they find this out very quickly. No doubt there 
were people in period that learned that if you put vinegar mother into a wine 
you got vinegar eventually, and started an industry. There were just as many 
people that were dismayed when they found vinegar mother growing in their 
potables I imagine, and cookbook writers to tell them what to do with it.

Corwyn