The Homemade Vinegar

Do you have any questions about homemade vinegar and making vinegar? Everything in this forum revolves around how to make homemade vinegar. Please observe our forum rules (see Helpful tips on use).

June 2018:

It has now been an unbelievable 16 years (!) since the last major change to the website and forums. When you think that two to three years are an eternity for the Internet sector, that is really something. In any case, there has been so much going on in terms of technology that it has become urgently necessary to completely redesign not only the forums, but also the entire website, from scratch and bring the programming up to date. Naturally, along with this we also introduced various new features; for example it was high time we allowed pictures to be uploaded with a forum post too or enabled users to subscribe to the forums via RSS feeds. And of course we have subsequently included pictures that are saved on external websites and were then integrated here using an img tag, so that no valuable information is lost. In any case, we hope you continue to have fun swapping experiences and trying things out.

Juni 2002:

At this point, we would first like to extend a big thank-you to all the users of our specialist questions for their lively involvement. Without you, we could never have developed such an informative and high-quality reference guide in such a short time (the first post dates from April 8, 1999). The large number of posts and high numbers of visitors made it necessary for us to develop the specialist questions ourselves using PHP and MySQL (at last no more annoying advertising banners!). During the course of this, we have hopefully introduced several improvements.

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Helpful tips on use:

Below are a few rules so we can maintain the high quality in the future as well.
  • This is a moderated forum. This means that anyone can write whatever they want, and the post will also be saved, but the content will only be published once it has been reviewed by our editorial staff, or deleted if necessary. Therefore, there is no point in posting the same contribution multiple times simply because it doesn’t appear immediately.
  • If you would like to see the most recent posts (irrespective of the topic), click Show the latest posts.
  • The forum is very comprehensive, and many topics have already been dealt with extensively. Therefore we recommend using the search function or alternatively the advanced search function before you add a new post in order to avoid having posts with the same content.
  • After you add or answer a post, you then have a chance to change the text you have written. So read through your text again carefully after saving it and click on “Change post” if necessary.
  • If you ask a question, then also expect an answer. Think about this as well when you are wording your question. Hardly anyone will answer vague questions such as “How do I distil schnapps?”, “No oil comes out; what am I doing wrong?” or “The vinegar isn’t fermenting, why?”.
  • The three topic areas, i.e. distilling spirits, distilling essential oils/hydrosols and making vinegar, are divided into three different websites. Each website contains the two forums “Recipes” for all the topics concerning fruit and recipes, and “Discussion” for all the other topics related to distilling spirits, essential oils/hydrosols or making vinegar. If we find posts that are unintentionally in the wrong forum, we will move them to the right forum. These posts have not been deleted, just moved.
  • ANY TYPE OF ADVERTISING WILL BE DELETED WITHOUT EXCEPTION! This also means seemingly “innocent” posts such as “I have a question about...” or alternatively “Does anyone have experience with...” followed by links or pictures to any external shops.
  • The same applies to bizarre posts which most likely come from drunks or don’t have the remotest thing to do with the topic area, e.g. football or “Where can you burn CDs here?” They will be deleted without exception.
  • All forums are STRICTLY ANONYMOUS; so never give any real names or addresses.
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So, that’s it. We hope you have a lot of fun swapping experiences, reading, posting and naturally also trying things out afterwards. Dr Malle & Dr Schmickl Dr. Malle & Dr. Schmickl
There are currently 26 entries in the forum.
  • Question 3

    Senthil | India, 30.04.2020 18:06:14

    I started 2 liter mash  with 3.5 PH and 15 brix ( added sugar as per your tables in book)Fermentation completely stopped 13th day,On 15 th day I checked brix was at 4 but no more sign of further fermentation.Now I am ready for second stage of

    fermentation,Can you Please help me out for the nutrients to be added in this stage.
    Reply
    Is your mash an apple mash? If yes, it’s not necessary to add any nutrients, apples have enough of them. You have to add nutrients if you want to ferment pure, distilled (and diluted) alcohol.
    The easiest way to add nutrients is to add apple juice. Not a fresh one, but from the supermarket, pay attention that the juice doesn’t contain any preservatives. I don’t know which brand mark of apple juice is available in India, but a “common” apple juice from supermarket is perfect. We add 1 liter of juice to approx. 10 liters of fermentation medium.
  • Question 2

    brian | USA, 27.02.2020 11:26:03
    Our concentrated juice is depectinated. The pectin improove the sugar-alcohol content or the taste ?
    Reply
    Pectins are the "walls" of the fruitcells. These walls prevent the extraktion of sugar and aromatic substances. Yeast destroys these wall with pectinase otherwise the yeast has nothing to eat. But sometimes the amount of pectinase is to low to survive, so it makes sence to add pectinase, this is the "Verflüssiger".


    Another advantage: if more fruitcells are liquified, more sugar is set free and simultaneosly more aromatic substances are set free and soluted now. Finally only the liquid is used, so it's important to get as much as possible aromatic substances in solution.

  • Question 1

    Greg | USA, 19.01.2020 17:53:48

    When describing ways to test the vinegar for both alcohol and acidic acid - there is no mention of ph. I am comfortable with titration. But I also have a small handheld ph meter. Could I use the ph meter to track the progress of the vinegar or is it too innacurate? How best to convert the PH to acidic percent ?

    Reply
    pH is a logarithmic scale. Thus, pH 1 is the same as 10-1, pH 7 = 10-7, and pH 14 = 10-14 mol H3O+ per liter.
    The acidity of vinegar is the unit percent acetic acid, thus grams acetic acid per 100 grams solution.
    Example:
    The acidity of vinegar changes from 4 to 5 percent. How much is this change in mol per liter? For easier calculation, we assume 100 grams is equal to 100 ml.
    So 4 percent is equal to 4 g / 100 ml. This is the same as 40 g / liter. Molar mass of acetic acid is 60.05 g / mol. Thus we have 40/60.05 = 0,66611 mol / l = 10-0,17645 mol / l.
    The same calculation for 5 percent: 50/60.05 = 0,83264 mol / l = 10-0,07954 mol / l.
    Thus the simplified “pAcidity” changes from 0,18 to 0,08. BUT: acetic acid is a so called soft acid, which means the CH3COOH is not completely split in CH3COO- and H+. The ratio of the split to unsplit portion depends on the specific pKs value of acetic acid (which is 4,76, see wikipedia).
    So far the theory. I wanted to verify this with my brand-new handheld pH-meter which I’ve never used up to now. But unfortunately the instructions for use says “soak in KCl for 24 hours”. T
There are currently 13 entries in the forum.

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