Good Question: What Is This Slime In My Vinegar?

This week we're covering your questions about leftover ingredients you find in your pantry as you clean it out, and in that line, here's a great question from Lexy, who is participating in the spring Kitchen Cure.

While cleaning out my cupboards last night, I found an interesting growth in a bottle of white wine vinegar. The bottle isn't more than a few months old. I suspect that the growth is a vinegar mother, of which I've heard, but about which I know very little. I was hoping that The Kitchn crew or readers could help me positively identify the growth — and offer some tips for using it (if it's a mother).

I'm attaching multiple photos; I didn't think I'd be able to remove the growth in one piece from the bottle, and tried to capture its awesomeness/disgustingness from several angles.

Wow, Lexy — congratulations! You have a mother. A vinegar mother, that is.

Yes, it looks rather grungy and scary, floating on the top of the vinegar like that, but this spongy mass of bacteria is completely harmless. A vinegar mother is just bacteria that feeds on alcoholic liquids, and the fact that one developed in your vinegar just means that there were some sugars or alcohol that weren't completely fermented in the vinegar process.

You have a few options with your vinegar mother. You can strain it out (use a coffee filter) and continue using the vinegar as-is. Or don't even bother straining it out; again, the vinegar mother won't hurt you at all.

If you want to remove it and do something useful with it, then you can start your own batch of vinegar! You can add the mother to white wine and start all over again. This homemade vinegar process can produce really wonderful, deep-flavored vinegar, especially when you let it continue over a period of years.

Here's a great guide to getting started with homemade vinegar at Sunset's One-Block-Diet blog (a great blog that we mentioned last week).

• Download: How to make vinegar
• The vinegar team's posts at One-Block-Diet: Team Vinegar - They started their vinegar (from homemade wine!) with a mother starter from Paula Wolfert, who has been making vinegar for years and year.

Readers, have you ever made vinegar?

Next question?

(Images: Lexy)

Comments (8)

just in case you are interested, here is a link to an egullet forum, where they get into details on making vinegar, and discussing the "mother" more...

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=45186

I just found an awesome old ceramic crock with a spigot which I intend to use for making red wine vinegar. The only thing that keeps me from jumping right in is the possibility of a fruit fly invasion.

Thanks! I unfortunately had to break the jar to remove the mother, and in the process some glass shards fell on it (her?). I rinsed it with luke-warm water to remove the debris, so I hope I didn't kill it. I put it in with some red wine leftovers (in a sterilized glass jar). The mother has a lovely square shape, and the new container is round; I wonder how long it will take to change shape? I'll check back in a few months if I have good news!
Lexy

"awesomeness/disgustingness " is the perfect way to describe those pictures. I love how the mother holds the square shape of the bottle so well... ick.

A good website for making wine vinegar is this one from the gang of pour.

http://www.gangofpour.com/diversions/vinegar/index.html

I made some good wine vinegar following their advice.

Woah. That is awesome beyond words. Bacteria are the bomb!

awww. i love the gentle care you took of it (her).

@sjbreeze, you can always put some cheesecloth over your container, lovely bacteria and air circulation in, buggies out.

Thanks saltyc. Good suggestion.