Homemade Apple Cider Vinegar
Apple scraps — cores, peels, bruised pieces — fermented with sugar and water into raw, unfiltered apple cider vinegar with a live mother. The ultimate zero-waste preservation project: you're making vinegar from the parts of apples you'd otherwise compost. Takes a month but requires almost no effort.
Ingredients
🌱 From Your Homestead
- apple scraps (peels, cores — enough to fill 3/4 of a quart jar)
🛒 From the Store
- sugar (1 tbsp per cup of water)
- filtered water (enough to cover)
- wide-mouth quart mason jar
- cheesecloth or coffee filter
- rubber band
How to Make It
- Gather your ingredients: apple scraps (peels, cores — enough to fill 3/4 of a quart jar), sugar (1 tbsp per cup of water), filtered water (enough to cover), wide-mouth quart mason jar, cheesecloth or coffee filter, and the rest.
- Prep your homestead ingredients — wash, chop, and measure: apple scraps (peels, cores — enough to fill 3/4 of a quart jar).
- Cover with cheesecloth, never a lid — the bacteria that create vinegar need oxygen. Stir daily for the first week. After 2 weeks, strain out the solids. In another 2–4 weeks, taste it — when it's tangy and acidic, it's vinegar. The cloudy strands forming are the mother; keep her for your next batch.
- Cook for approximately 15 min + 4–6 weeks ferment. Adjust to taste and serve 32 portions.
- Plate, enjoy, and share with your household!
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