Vinegar is a liquid substance consisting mainly of acetic acid (CH3CO2H) and water, the acetic acid being produced through the fermentation of ethanol by acetic acid bacteria. It is today mainly used in the kitchen as a general cooking ingredient, but historically, as the most easily available mild acid, it had a great variety of industrial, medical, and domestic uses, some of which (such as a general household cleanser) are still promoted today. Commercial vinegar is produced either by fast or slow fermentation processes. In general, slow methods are used with traditional vinegars, and fermentation proceeds slowly over the course of weeks or months. The longer fermentation period allows for the accumulation of a nontoxic slime composed of acetic acid bacteria. Fast methods add mother of vinegar (i.e., bacterial culture) to the source liquid before adding air using a venturi pump system or a turbine to promote oxygenation to obtain the fastest fermentation. In fast production processes, vinegar may be produced in a period ranging from 20 hours to three days.
Read more about Vinegar: Culinary Uses, Medical Uses, Cleaning Uses, Miscellaneous
Famous quotes containing the word vinegar:
“My grandfather fell on Vinegar Hill,
And fighting was not his trade;
But his rusty pike’s in the cabin still,
With Hessian blood on the blade.””
—Joseph I. C. Clarke (1846–1925)
“Until, on Vinegar Hill, the fatal conclave.
Terraced thousands died, shaking scythes at cannon.
The hillside blushed, soaked in our broken wave.
They buried us without shroud or coffin
And in August the barley grew up out of the grave.”
—Seamus Heaney (b. 1939)
“He packs wool sheared in April, honey
in combs, linen, leather
tanned from deerhide,
and vinegar in a barrel
hooped by hand at the forge’s fire.”
—Donald Hall (b. 1928)