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Vinegar, Pickles, and Pickling: Fill

Or a firkin may be used if fitted with a tight cover having one or more auger holes to admit air through it. Fill the receptacle about two thirds full, or a little more, so as to expose as large a surface as possible to the air. Cover the openings with cheese cloth and let stand in a warm place. Where the conditions are favorable it will be converted into vinegar in about two weeks or a month. Or for a somewhat better quality, take 5 gallons of water to 1 gallon of molasses, and add a quart of yeast.

The addition of a gallon of good vinegar will hasten the process. Odds and ends of sirup, as rinsings from fruit jars, molasses cans, and the like, may be added to the liquor from time to time.

Or for a cheaper quality, take 25 gallons of warm rain water, 4 gallons of molasses, and 1 gallon of brewers' yeast.

To Manufacture Vinegar for Sale. -Grocers and other merchants who sell vinegar at retail may keep themselves supplied with vinegar in the following manner:

Have on hand three or more barrels in multiples of three, and use them in rotation. If less than a barrel of vinegar is sold each week, three barrels will be sufficient, as the process will be completed in three weeks or less. Commence with a barrel of good commercial vinegar. Before it is quite empty draw off and pour into each of the other two barrels 2 or 3 gallons of vinegar. Now fill up the vinegar barrel with a fresh liquor in the proportion of 1 gallon of molasses to 5 gallons more or less of warm rain water according to the quality of vinegar desired, and about 1 quart of yeast for each 12 gallons of the mixture.

Fill up the other two barrels with the same liquor. The first or old vinegar barrel containing more or less lees and mother will turn to vinegar very quickly, and may be sold first, and refilled when it gets low. By that time the second will be ready to use, or nearly so. After the three barrels are once started, if filled up when nearly emptied, they will furnish a constant supply.

Or if upward of two barrels are sold each week, six casks may be kept going in the same manner. A goodsized bunghole should be kept open to admit the air, but they should have two or three thicknesses of cheese cloth tacked over them to keep out dust and insects.

Or to manufacture vinegar on a large scale summer and winter alike, it is necessary either to have a large cellar equipped with suitable vats or casks, or a building which is well ventilated, and can be warmed in winter by means of a furnace or otherwise. In addition to suitable arrangements for storing ordinary casks in tiers, and the necessary apparatus for leaching the wash through beechwood shavings by the quick or German process, an important part of the equipment is one or more large ripening casks or vats capable of holding 500 to 1,000 gallons and upward. The cider or other "wash," after having been turned into vinegar by either the slow or quick process and run off into smaller casks, should be transferred at intervals to these large casks so that the output of the establishment will be of a uniform flavor. Care must, of course, be taken that the casks, vats, and other apparatus used to produce a particular kind or grade of vinegar should not be used for any other purpose, if the object is to build up a trade for a particular brand or quality.

Malt Vinegar.-In the vicinity of breweries, where wort can be procured at a reasonable price, malt vinegar can be made very cheaply.

Add to each 25 gallons of wort 1 gallon of beer yeast. Ferment for about thirty-five or forty hours, and draw VINEGAR, PICKLES, AND PICKLING off the liquor into casks about two thirds full. Let them stand at a temperature of 70° to 75° F. Keep the bungs out to admit plenty of air.

Sugar Vinegar. To make sugar vinegar for domestic use, add + pint of yeast to a solution of 14 pounds of sugar in 1 gallon of water. Let the mixture ferment for about three days in a large earthenware jar or other receptacle, placed where the temperature will be at least 80° F.

Then draw off the clear liquor from the sediment into a clean cask and add 1 ounce of cream of tartar and 1 ounce of bruised raisins. Let stand until sufficiently sour, clarify, bottle and cork for use.

Or boil any quantity of coarse brown sugar with filtered rain water at the rate of 2 pounds of sugar to the gallon and with a skimmer remove the scum as fast as it appears. Now add a quart of cold water for every gallon of hot. Let cool, and add about a pint of yeast for each 6 gallons of the liquor. Run into a cask. Cover the bunghole with wire gauze or several thicknesses of cheese cloth, and place it out in the sun. If this vinegar is made in the early spring and exposed to summer heat it will be ready for use by midsum- In winter six months will be required. mer.