Apple scrap vinegar costs pennies to make and cuts down on food waste. It can be used for salad dressings, the acid element in your salt/fat/acid/heat cooking, shrub mocktail/cocktails, a lemon juice substitute, or if you’re like me, as your hair conditioner. It requires fermenting time but is almost all hands off. It is different from apple cider vinegar as apple cider vinegar is used from the discarded apple cider pulp and we will be using the scraps of our apples (the core and peels) so it will taste different. Also, the acidity is lower than apple cider vinegar so you most likely won’t want to use it for canning. But it is incredibly useful and is absolutely worth the minimal effort it takes to make.

To begin, you want to save your cores and peels from your apples. If you aren’t making an apple pie or other apple dessert so you don’t have peels, no worries, you can just use the cores. I freeze mine in the freezer until I have enough to start my batch. Once you’ve saved up however much you want, put them into a ceramic or glass vessel, and make a sugar water solution of 1 tbs sugar: 1 cup water (filtered, if you have high chlorinated tap water) and you want to have enough of the sugar water solution to cover the apple scraps. When you pour it onto the apple scraps, some of the scraps might float to the top and that’s okay. From there, cover it with a cloth and rubber band and stir it a few times a day for a 1-2 weeks. On the 2nd or 3rd day, you will notice it starts to bubble. That’s a good sign! It means all the bacteria are doing what they should be. At the end of 2 weeks, strain your fruit, put the vinegar back into the vessel and cover with a cloth and rubber band for another 2 weeks or up to a month (however you like it to taste, it will become more acidic the longer it sits uncovered). At this point, you will funnel it into glass bottles, seal them and store away from direct light or heat.

This is a really simple and cheap way to make vinegar. Homesteaders and many other zero wasters make this all the time so if you want more info on this, google “apple scrap vinegar” and you’ll get all kinds of information. Like I said, I use it for hair conditioner, in my shrubs and for lemon substitute when I’m cooking and don’t have fresh lemon juice. It costs pennies to make and a great way to cut down on food waste! Just do it!