While
I was researching the chemistry of gelato, I kept coming up empty. It was then that I realized that eating
gelato is much more fun than researching it, so I decided to change my topic
for this week to my other favorite thing here in Italy: balsamic vinegar. After obsessing over how great the
balsamic vinegar at dinner was earlier this week, I realized that I had
absolutely no idea how balsamic vinegar is made. So, decided that I should find
out to see if I could make it at home.
It
turns out that even though balsamic vinegar is classified as one, it isn’t
really a wine vinegar at all because it does not come directly from wine. Instead, balsamic vinegar is made from white
grape pressings (typically of the Trebbiano variety), that are first boiled down
to a dark syrup. Even though white
grapes are used to produce traditional balsamic vinegar, the end product has a
dark color due to the deactivation of proteins in the grape musk when they are
boiled down. This dark syrup is
then fermented in anaerobic then aerobic steps involving yeasts.
Once the syrup has fermented, the ethanol that has been
produced is converted to acetic acid by ambient acetic acid bacteria. When this process is complete, the
aging process involving a series of wooden barrels and at least 12 years
begins.
Conversion of
Ethanol to Acetic Acid
Aging
in barrels made of different types of wood is an extremely important component
of making tradition balsamic vinegar.
A barrel set of five barrels, each smaller than the next and made of a
different woods than the preceding barrel, is used to age the balsamic vinegar
and imbue it with different properties.
In addition to giving
balsamic vinegar a robust taste profile, the wooden barrels allow water to
escape and for the vinegar to concentrate. The wood also allows for the acetic acid and other volatile
compounds to remain intact while still exchanging small molecules with the
outside environment by acting as a semi-permeable filter (just as in wine
production).
The Barrel Set
Used for Aging Balsamic Vinegar
The
balsamic vinegar in the casks is never removed all at once; instead, small
portions of it are removed from the smallest cask each year, and are replaced
with a portion from the preceding cask.
The contents of the largest cask are replaced with the newly boiled down
and fermented syrup. This process
is important for making sure the vinegar content of each cask remains the same,
and to compensate for loss of volume due to bottling, leakage, and evaporation
of water. The balsamic vinegar
must stay in these casks for at least 12 years to be considered traditional
balsamic vinegar.
The
end composition of balsamic vinegar is extremely complex, and involves a
multitude of different polyphenolic compounds (these compounds often act as
antioxidants); acids such as acetic, malic, and gluconic acid; and different
sugars like glucose and fructose.
Some of these compounds have purported health benefits, and many people
(including my Grandmother’s 105 year old friend) often take small doses of
vinegar every day to promote good health.
Regardless of any extra benefits, balsamic vinegar makes for an
incredible way to add a ton flavor to many dishes without using very much
(although I’ll be honest, I often just pour a ton of the stuff on to bread, or
really anything because it tastes so good).
Overall,
balsamic vinegar is the classiest of all the vinegars due to its extensive
aging process (12 years compared to the normal few months for other vinegars)
and its long history that began ~900 years ago in Modena, Italy. It’s uses range from providing health
benefits to providing amazing pops of taste to a variety of dishes and
appetizers. Despite all this, my most important discovery during this endeavor
to find how to make balsamic vinegar is made is that if I were to try to make
this tasty substance at my house, I would probably end up making something
inedible. I figure I’ll just leave
it to the professionals and buy a nice bottle of aceto balsamico here in Italy to take home with me; in the end, it
just seems like a better idea.
Bottled
Balsamic Vinegar
http://www.whisky.de/archiv/experts/starch.htm
http://purehealthyoil.com/recipe/balsamic-vinegar-is-not-a-wine-vinegar/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinegar
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Balsamic_Vinegar
http://voices.yahoo.com/10-health-benefits-vinegar-561289.html
http://www.amazon.com/Italian-Products-Traditional-Balsamic-3-5-Ounce/dp/B001D6B1BC
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