Mother Questions

[blackfin1]

Hello All: When making vinegar, you put the mother in with the wine and seal with cheese cloth. Now when you finally taste vinegar, do you strain out the mother or leave it or just siphon out liquid vinegar? Can you reuse the mother and just add more wine to the gallon jug?

Thanks,
Sal

[grapeadmin]

Depends on your set up. If you have a spigot you can draw a little vinegar out from under the mother without disturbing it too much. Otherwise, remove the bulk of the mother and bottle the vinegar which was under the mother. You can then start another batch by putting a small portion of the old mother and some of the new vinegar in with the new wine to be converted.

[blackfin1]

Thanks for the reply, so just to clarify, the good vinegar is below the mother. Can the mother sink to the bottom after a while? Do you have to bottle the vinegar before the mother sinks?

THanks,
Sal

[grapeadmin]

Right. If the mother sinks it is dead. Sometimes another mother will quickly reform on the top. If it does not, bottle the vinegar soon as if you don't the wine is now exposed to air and the vinegar will take on an 'oxidized' aroma/flavor.

thanks
john

[virginiavinegarworks]

Since the acetobacter need oxygen a preferred vessel, over a jug would be either a gallon wide mouth jar or a crock. The gelatinous mother which forms on top is nothing more than bacterial cellulose. It seems to be called the mother because it protects whats underneath of it. It also inhabits the oxygen absorption of the liquid underneath. The bacteria lives in the liquid not in the mother. There is bacteria on and about the mother however it is not integral to the vinegar making process other than a sign that conversion is taking place. We remove the mothers regularly and compost them. Save a portion of your batch of vinegar for inoculation of your next batch. Steph and Jay

[grapeadmin]

Do you not find that without the gelatinous cover of the mother that the vinegar will take on an oxidized flavor?

john
g and g

[virginiavinegarworks]

Hi John and thanks for the nice welcome. What we have found so far is that if inoculation rate is sufficient with living bacteria from a previous batch, the bacteria should utilize the oxygen as food before the oxygen has a chance to oxidize the wine. That is why we periodically remove the mother during each conversion. We do use the Orleans method and all of our vinegar has been made this way so far. The response from farmers market patrons, chefs, etc. has been over-whelming. We hope many more people decide to enter the local food production scene by making high quality vinegars. We source our raw product from wineries who have distressed wines ( high volatile acids, some H2S issues and sometimes mild brett). We would like to capitalize on the possibilities related to grapeseed oil production. Does anyone have any ideas on how to remove the grape seeds from the pressed grape must which is currently discarded and composted by most wineries? Jay and Steph

[grapeadmin]

Thanks for the answer. No, I am afraid I have not seen anything in the way of seed removal.

Sorry about that
john