History[edit]

While vinegar making may be as old as alcoholic brewing, the first documented evidence of
vinegar making and use was by the ancient Babylonians around 3000 BC.[8] They primarily made
vinegar from dates, figs, and beer and used it for both culinary and medicinal purposes. Traces
of it also have been found in Egyptian urns. In East Asia, the Chinese began professionalizing
vinegar production in the Zhou dynasty.[9] The book Zhou Li mentions many noble or royal
households had a "vinegar maker" as a specialized position. Most vinegar making then was
concentrated in what is now Shanxi province near the city Taiyuan, which remains a famous
vinegar-making region today. Many Chinese vinegars and their uses for culinary and medicinal
purposes were written down in the agricultural manual Qimin Yaoshu (齊民要術).[9]
The Greeks and Romans frequently used vinegars made from wine. The Spartans had vinegar
as a part of their traditional broth melas zomos. The Roman Columella described the ingredients
and process for making several types of vinegars in his work Res Rustica.[9]
In the late Middle Ages, vinegar making was slowly being professionalized in Europe, with the
French city of Orléans becoming particularly famous for the quality of its vinegars through a
formalized fermentation and aging process, which became known as the Orléans
process.[8][9] During this time, malt vinegar also began to develop in England, where it was first
known as alegar.[10] Balsamic vinegar also began its evolution in the Duchy of Modena in Italy,
though it would not become widely known until the Napoleonic Wars after being sold abroad by
French troops.[11]
In the 19th century, vinegar production underwent many dramatic changes, such as rapid
industrialization and scientific analysis. The first large-scale industrial process for vinegar
production was invented by Karl Sebastian Schüzenbach in the Kingdom of Baden in
1823.[9] Known as the packed generator, it circulated alcohol over beechwood shavings to reduce
fermentation times from several months down to 1–2 weeks. This process also facilitated the rise
of vinegar made from pure alcohol called spirit vinegar or distilled white vinegar. Japan also
began industrializing vinegar production during the last days of the Tokugawa shogunate, when
Matazaemon Nakano, a man from a traditional sake brewing family, discovered sake lees could
be used to make rice vinegar. This helped provide an ample supply of vinegar for the burgeoning
popularity of sushi in Japan. The company he founded, now known as Mizkan, is headquartered
in Kyoto, and is the largest vinegar producer in the world.[9]
Likewise, vinegar fermentation became understood as a natural and biological process. Louis
Pasteur made the decisive discovery that a special type of bacteria, later known as acetic acid
bacteria, were the agents of fermentation for vinegar production. [12]
In the 20th century, vinegar production again was revolutionized by the invention of the
submerged fermentation process that cut production times down to 1–2 days.[13] This allowed the
mass production of cheap vinegar around the world.

Production[edit]
Main article: Acetic acid § Production
Commercial vinegar is produced either by a fast or a slow fermentation process. In general, slow
methods are used in traditional vinegars, where fermentation proceeds over the course of a few
months to a year. The longer fermentation period allows for the accumulation of a nontoxic slime
composed of acetic acid bacteria.
Fast methods add mother of vinegar (bacterial culture) to the source liquid before adding air to
oxygenate and promote the fastest fermentation. In fast production processes, vinegar may be
produced in 1-3 days.
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