Apple cider vinegar

Signs of fall are popping up all around: shorter days, chilly nights, and apples falling off trees everywhere you look. Over the last week we've harvested at least three crates.

Epleslang (literally "apple stealing") is practically a national pastime here in Norway. Usually it falls within the domain of young children and adolescents, though a few weeks ago we were woken up at 4am on a Sunday morning by a gaggle of drunken university students on the hunt for apple trees in our kolonihage. For those outside of Norway, a kolonihage is essentially a collection of allotment gardens with small cabins parceled out to lucky apartment-dwelling residents of Scandinavian cities. The one we are part of in Oslo used to be in a rural area when it was built in 1929, but now is wedged between affluent suburban neighborhoods, university housing, and a forest.

Anyway, the apples pictured above were turned into a cider that is slowly fermenting in a glass carboy with ale yeast—supposedly this yields a sweeter alcoholic cider as ale yeast is "lazier" than traditional cider yeast. Once it's ready and tasted I'll post our recipe.

But before that, consider this excellent way to use up all the peels and cores usually discarded during cider making: make your own apple cider vinegar.

Not only is apple cider vinegar extremely easy to make, it's a folk remedy for a myriad of ailments. I personally don't know if all the claims are true, but my digestion is pretty great and vinegar is a delicious culinary addition to all sorts of food. Here is the way I make mine:

1. Find and clean a large wide mouthed glass jar with or without a lid.

2. Fill the jar almost all the way up with apple peels and cores (preferable organic / non-waxed) and then with water. The tap water in Oslo is very clean but used distilled if this is not the case where you live.

3. Cover your jar with a square of clean cheesecloth or towel and store it in a dark place. For the first week, try to stir your apple mixture once a day to get the fermentation going.

4. After two to three weeks (or longer, depending on the temperature) you should see a white or grey, sometimes stringy mass on top. This is the mother. Success!

5. Strain the liquid but make sure to keep the the mother. Discard the apples.

6. Let your strained liquid and mother keep fermenting together for approximately a month. After that, taste your vinegar with a clean spoon every few days until it is strong enough (to taste).

7. When you are finally ready to bottle your apple cider vinegar, make sure to bottle the mother along with the vinegar. It is more nutritious and will stay fresher longer this way. Store in a cool and dark place.

Bonus: you can reuse your healthy mother to make other vinegars. A few years ago, for example, I did this with half bottle of old red wine that I added fresh rosemary sprigs to. Yum!