"If people could see how their food is produced, they would change how they eat."
--Michael Pollan
Seasonal Recipes
The Vinegar Project
I must confess that I don't always cook seasonally and locally. This time of year when the garden is almost barren and the stores are full of tropical fruits, I am often seduced by oranges, clementines, grapefruit and pineapples. But to ease my conscience, I only buy Florida oranges and grapefruit and only in the winter, when they are in season. And Florida isn't THAT far from Tennessee.
I recently acquired a copy of Diana Kennedy's book The Art of Mexican Cooking. In it she has a recipe for making pineapple vinegar from the trimmings. Not wanting to waste any part of a pineapple, that had traveled several thousand miles to my table, I decided to try making vinegar from the peal and core.
So I put the peals and core and in the gallon jug along with 1 1/2 quarts water and a heaping 1/4 cup brown sugar. I shook the jug well, covered the spout with a cloth and let it sit. After 4 days a little foam begin to develop on the top. Fermentation had begun. Fermentation will continue for up to 3 weeks, until all the sugar is converted and the liquid becomes acidy. At this point the mother will develop. The mother is a gelatinous disk, that should become quite solid over the next 3 weeks. Once this happens I will strain off the liquid for use.
While I have made vinegar from leftover wine, I have never started it from the raw ingredients. So I am excited to see what happens.
Follow up--This was a disaster. The pineapple rotted. I assume it was because not all of the fruit was below the liquid. That was when I realized how stupid my choice of container was. I still don't know how I will get that pineapple out of the jar so I can recycle the jar. I think I will stick with making vinegar from leftover wine. That is a much simpler process.
Posted on January 13, 2010
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