Wine into Vinegar (on purpose)

[dondford]

I plan on making a batch of "Welch" Wine using one of the recipes on this Forum, but the end product will be vinegar for red wine vinegar and faux Balsamic vinegar. I plan on making the wine, then "turning" it by adding non-pasteurized vinegar as the vinegar "mother". The Welch wine recipes seem straight forward, but do any of your guys have any experience in vinegar making. Are there any special considerations to the recipe if the final product will be vinegar? I would appreciate any thoughts, advice or suggestions.

Thanks,
Don

 

[pumpkinman2012]

I'd keep it far from your wine, the acetic acid bacteria live in wineries, on winery equipment and in the air. Once it has established itself in your home winery, it will live there and can enter your wine every time you open a fermenter, carboy or bottle.

 

[Yooper]

I've done it.

The only thing to be aware of is that it's hard to get a high ABV wine to start- it's more likely to get other contamination other than vinegar. So it's diluted with water to a lower ABV.

I've had ok results (not great) with doing it with red wine, but much better results with hard apple cider and unhopped beer (malt vinegar).

I don't do it any more, partly because it still wasn't as good as the store bought.

 

[rlmiller10]

I've done it.

The only thing to be aware of is that it's hard to get a high ABV wine to start- it's more likely to get other contamination other than vinegar. So it's diluted with water to a lower ABV.

I've had ok results (not great) with doing it with red wine, but much better results with hard apple cider and unhopped beer (malt vinegar).

I don't do it any more, partly because it still wasn't as good as the store bought.

Not to derail this, well not much, but it seems dead anyhow. Yooper, how did you make vinegar from cider? I have some old apple cider (not hard so it was pasteurized and water bath canned) that I was thinking of trying to make cider from. Just put it in a jug with a cloth over top and add a bit of vinegar which has the mother?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Yooper]

Not to derail this, well not much, but it seems dead anyhow. Yooper, how did you make vinegar from cider? I have some old apple cider (not hard so it was pasteurized and water bath canned) that I was thinking of trying to make cider from. Just put it in a jug with a cloth over top and add a bit of vinegar which has the mother?

Thanks in advance.

It has to have alcohol in it- so it has to be hard cider. The acetobacter "eat" alcohol, and produce vinegar.

 

[justineaton]

I have three five gallon carboys of different honey wines going in the basement and just bottles about four gallons of vinegar. I didn't know it was a bad idea to make them in the same place. Now that the vinegar is gone will my wines be ok if I open them up in a few weeks to rack?

 

[WVMJ]

We did our first vinegar from cider this year, we keep all the hard cider and wine stuff downstairs in the basement with its own tools, and keept the cider vinegar going upstairs in a kitchen pantry and it has its own dedicated tools not to every be used for hard ciders or wines. Lots of fun and it tastes better than storebought as we used some tannic crab apples in it. One thing you dont want to do it sulfite your must as that can inhibit the bacteria. I also keep a spray bottle of starsan in the kitchen, everything gets a spritz after being washed off just as an extra precation. We used a big mouth bubbler that is now dedicated just to vinegar. WVMJ

 

[Captive]

I make vinegar with some of my wine. I make both white and red wine vinegar. Used Braggs apple cider vinegar to get it started. Once you have a good mother established, all you have to do is add some wine once in a while. I don't dilute my wine additions with water, so the vinegar is much more potent than the 5% stuff in the store. The trick is to only add a bit of wine at a time. This way the acetobactor has a chance to digest some of the alcohol before more wine is added. Here's a video that shows my mother: [ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GajT6fwczE[/ame]