Recently I've been getting into fermentation, which even as I type this seems like a weird thing to be 'into'.  Two weeks ago I started a batch of Mexican pineapple vinegar, from Wild Fermentation by Sandor Katz, I tasted it on Sunday and it's almost got a vinegary taste.  It needs another week or so of fermenting on the counter I think.

When I was last home to Toronto for a visit with my Omi I told her about my experiment with making vinegar, she laughed at me and told me that this was how they made vinegar when she was a child.  She's eastern European, so they didn't use pineapple but other kinds of fruit.

It's funny to me that my Grandmother moved to Canada more then 50 years ago to give her family a better life, and a generation later I'm making vinegar the same way she did on a rural family farm in the 1930's.

I'm not sure what that says about me that I feel the need to try and make my own vinegar instead of spending 1$ on a bottle at the store, but it certainly felt nice to give my Omi a good chuckle.

 


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Twwly link
07/09/2009 20:09

Would love to know how you are fermenting... never done it myself!

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Sydney
07/10/2009 08:31

It was deliriously simple. I got the recipe out of 'Wild Fermentation' by Sandor Katz, which is a good resource if you're thinking of getting into fermenting.

It's the skin off of one pineapple roughly chopped, one quart of water and a quarter cup of sugar. Just dissolve the sugar in the water, add the chopped pineapple rind and cover with cheese cloth. Let that sit for a week and then remove the rind. Cover the liquid with cheese cloth again and let it sit until it's vinegary (mine took another two weeks).

There's going to be a little mold on the surface where the pineapple rind was exposed to the air, but remove all the mold you can see and at the end of the process there was no longer be any mold.

I'm pretty sure you can do this with other fruits and/or fruit peels as well.

My next fermentation project is going to be beer, hopefully :)

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