I have been wondering. If you pulverized a fresh apple ( food processor?) and squeezed out the juice through cheesecloth, and then added it to a jug of commercial Apple Cider Vinegar, would it ferment and add the mother to the whole jug? ACV is really only fermented apple juice and it has been purified etc. when it is done fermenting. I think by state law, all apple cider in my state (PA) must be pasteurized or sterilized and that kills the mother. The trick is to find a non sterilized source of apple juice and let it ferment. I don't have to worry about this because I have a local source of real apple cider -- although he is getting older But I have been wondering if injecting raw juice into ACV will reintroduce the good bellybugs.
Check this out. As I understand vinegar making the apple cider needs to first be fermented to get hard cider. Then by adding an apple cider vinegar that still has the live mother such as Braggs the mother will change the alcohol into the acid that makes vinegar. So... apples into apple cider then cider into hard cider then hard cider into vinegar. Never done it myself but I have been thinking off and on about trying as I usually get alot of apples in the fall from local trees from friends.
Nice site but is it really that technical? I just left my jug of apple juice in the fridge for weeks and weeks. I think the catalyst is that the apple juice( cider) was pure and fresh from the press with no preservative or purification at all. For those who have never had it, fresh cider the first day after pressing tastes just like apple juice. By the third day if it is not pasteurized or anti-bacterialed with light, it starts to ferment and as a touch of fizz. Refrigerate at this stage if you haven't before. By the end of a week it has a fermenting taste that is described in this area as 'scratchy' and is considered ideal drinking at that point. You start to see the mother on the bottom of the jug and depending upon your preference, you shake up the jug first or not. The longer it sits, the scratchier it gets until you are sipping vinegar. yeow! I don't know at what stage the cider is considered hard cider. I do know that if you drink too much of the fizzy stuff especially if it is delicious, any problems with constipation will be solved! I have never gotten drunk on the fizzy stuff nor known anyone who has. ( And two glasses of wine will suffice for me.) After the fizz has gone, it tastes too much like vinegar to want to try to get drunk on it. Re: your making your own. My mom tried it years ago and invested in a small hand press. We found that the fruit should be ground up first to release the juices and then had problems with finding a straining cloth that could withstand the pressure of the press. Wasn't worth the effort considering how many orchards at the time had cider around here. Also it takes a lot of apples!
You dont' put it in the fridge, you put it somewhere that it's going to be around 75 degrees. Put a piece of cheesecloth or even just a paper towel or coffee filter on top fastened with a rubber band. It needs to "breathe." But you also have to keep bugs out. Leaving fresh, unprocessed apple juice in this way for a long enough time will make ACV even without the Braggs for the starter. Apples have a type of yeast in the skin that makes this possible. I'm no chemist but I make ACV all the time. All you really have to do it store it somewhere like I have said above for a month or more. Use a straw and taste it from time to time. If you get any mold you'll have throw out the whole batch. Mold will be green or black, even white. But the "mother" that forms on the top will be a whitish tan sort of color and slimy to the touch. That is fine. With it's high sugar content and eventually high acid there shouldn't be any mold but it can happen rarely. It's not one bit complicated. To clarify, that "mother" is what you need to keep making ACV more easily. Add it to your next batch, and each batch will then end up with two: The one you put in, and then it makes another on the top. My chickens love them cut into 1/2 inch squares lol. Or share them. Or whatever.
