[capozzoli]

Its my understanding that malt vinegar is made without hops and beer vinegar is made with hops.

[tschmidlin]

Ah, ok, I've never heard of beer vinegar.  That's cool, have you ever had any?  I might make some soon, do some test batches in mason jars with loose fitting lids.

[tschmidlin]

Now you have to try making your own yogurt. We do that in the winter, make it on top of the radiators wrapped in towels.

Sorry cap, forgot to respond to this.  I've been looking at making yogurt, I checked out a few websites and considered a yogurt maker.  Those are pretty pricey and probably not worth it to me, but we don't have any radiators either

But I do have an incubator I can use, which I normally use for fermenting ales in my garage in the winter.  It should hold temp that high well enough to make some, so I'll probably give that a try.  What method do you use?

I'm thinking about making kefir too . . .

[capozzoli]

You can use an electric heat pad too. Might use a lot less electricity. Ball Mason jars work great.

I heat my milk up to about 110. Then remove it and let it cool to below 100. Then I introduce some culture from a commercial yogurt. Close the lid, wrap it in towels and put it on a heat source that will keep it warm. 8 hurs later you will have the best yogurt in the world.

Plain milk will make a runny finished product. Low fat milk will make a beverage like product. Half an half will make a thicker solid type product.

You can even add lots of powdered milk to regular milk to get a thicker finished product.

Then after you get that there are all kinds of things to do like adding fruit on the bottom. Or things like Russian baked milk. That is milk that has been reduced to remove lots of the water before culturing it. .

[Steve]

Any one have any good online sources for vinegar mothers? I will probably try the Whole Foods method, but the one-hour drive to Whole Foods vs. ordering online.

[tschmidlin]

You can get vinegar from Eden Organics, among other places:
http://www.edenfoods.com/store/index.php?cPath=27_53
http://www.swansonvitamins.com/DYH012/ItemDetail?SourceCode=INTL406

For actual mothers, you might try Local Harvest:
http://www.localharvest.org/organic-red-wine-mother-of-vinegar-starter-C10988
http://www.localharvest.org/malt-vinegar-culture-mother-of-vinegar-C11100

Or these places:
http://www.beer-winemaking.com/catalog/vinegar-starters
http://www.beer-wine.com/products/vinegar-cultures

You can even find some vinegar with mother on ebay!  But you should be able to get some at any natural food store in the area.  It will be a lot cheaper than buying online and paying for shipping.

I haven't bought anything from any of those links, btw.

[euge]

I've made yogurt before, and top of the fridge covered with a towel is usually warm enough. Made it from nonfat dry milk, which on it's own makes more of a slimy product- but it's yogurt!

My dad used top make it from fresh water-buffalo milk.

Crème fraiche is real easy to make and should be in any kitchen. Very versatile. I make it with whole cream and buttermilk.

[tschmidlin]

Plain milk will make a runny finished product. Low fat milk will make a beverage like product. Half an half will make a thicker solid type product.

You can even add lots of powdered milk to regular milk to get a thicker finished product.

Yeah, a mason jar and some milk with fresh yogurt in it.  I don't mind beverage like, that's why I like kefir so much.  But powdered milk to make it thicker would be good too, sometimes.  I'll have to figure out a good spot for it.  I don't understand these yogurt makes with their little jars - it's essentially a slow cooker with temperature control.  Make me one of those where I can dial it to 110F and put whatever size jars I want in a little bit of a water bath, and I'm good to go.  Maybe I'll just do it in a cooler, or with a heating pad.  After I try the top of the fridge

Crème fraiche is real easy to make and should be in any kitchen. Very versatile. I make it with whole cream and buttermilk.

I'm going to have to give this a try too!  Sounds like a good thing to serve at Thanksgiving, last year I baked bread and made nutter, in addition to the turkey, stuffing, etc.

[corkybstewart]

I turned a batch of very mediocre pale ale into a very good malt vinegar a few years ago.  I also made a batch of cider just for vinegar.  It was truly amazing with crab or shrimp, it made the best West Indies I've ever tasted.  Right now I have a batch of malt vinegar almost ready to pasteurize and bottle, and I'm about to start batches of red and white wine vinegars.
I fermented the cider vinegar in one of my cornies, I left it in there over a year.  Back then I was very ignorant of the dangers of letting acetobacter loose in the brewery, but there's no way to know how many dozen batches of beer have gone through that particular keg over the past 10 years and yet I've never had an infected keg of beer. 

[tschmidlin]

That sounds awesome, vinegar is so easy

i'm curious, why do you bother pasteurizing the vinegar when you bottle it?   It's not like anything is going to grow . . .

[capozzoli]

I've made yogurt before, and top of the fridge covered with a towel is usually warm enough. Made it from nonfat dry milk, which on it's own makes more of a slimy product- but it's yogurt!

My dad used top make it from fresh water-buffalo milk.

Crème fraiche is real easy to make and should be in any kitchen. Very versatile. I make it with whole cream and buttermilk.

I found creme fresh to be very hard. Not so much to do but the "real thing" has to be made with cream that has not been pasteurized. Real hard to find for me. I have gotten it a couple of times from people I know.

The idea is to get whole un-pasturized milk then let the real thick cream settle to the top. Then skim it off and let it sit out at about 100 degrees for twenty four hours. It will get thick.

euge if you used cream and then cultured it with butter milk. That is just sour cream.

Now, butter milk is another story, most butter milk in this country is actually kefir. Real butter milk is the whey left over from churning butter.

Im a real nit picker aint I?

Funny you mention the fridge, I used to make it on the back of an old frige where the heat exchanger grill was. Made a shelf for the to yogurt to sit on the condenser. Worked great.  

Maybe we need a new thread?

[corkybstewart]

That sounds awesome, vinegar is so easy

i'm curious, why do you bother pasteurizing the vinegar when you bottle it?   It's not like anything is going to grow . . .

I'm an old guy, I went to the library and looked at a couple of books on vinegar making and they both said to increase shelf life the vinegar should be heated to 170F for 20 minutes, then cooled quickly before bottling.

[capozzoli]

Thats interesting.

I always heard that leaving the mother in there will increase shelf life. As long as it has done all of its work converting alcohol to acid and you remove oxygen by closing the lid, they say.

I like seeing the mother in there.

Oh yeah, No, I have never had the beer vinegar.But we were talking about this before. Not sure if it ws this forum though.

Another thing to remember though, if you make beer vinegar with hops in there you must protect it from the light, just like with beer the vinegar could get skunked.

[euge]

Anyone watch Swamp People? One scene in a family kitchen there were maybe three one gallon growlers with fermentation locks sitting on the counter. I was like "beer?" but then naw... maybe mead, but now I think it could be vinegar.

[tschmidlin]

Never heard of it - but why put a fermentation lock on vinegar?  The acetobacter need the O2 to convert the ethanol to acetic acid, so it seems unlikely.

Probably homebrew of some sort.  I have a hard time picturing mead in a show called "swamp people" (what is this show?) but I'd guess it's some fermented sugar of some sort that will later be "concentrated" through some heating and  . . . "selection" of the fumes.  Just a guess though.