January 2012
The word vinegar is from the French “vin aigre” meaning sour wine; ‘a wine past its time.’ Grape fermentation first converts sugars into alcohol, making wine. A second fermentation converts the alcohol into acetic acid. When the second fermentation is complete you have vinegar.
Following wine, vinegar is believed to be the oldest fermented food. Records from more than 10,000 years ago declare appreciation of vinegar's many values. Today's vinegar uses and appreciated benefits remain quite numerous and the Internet is an easy way to discover them. Health benefits from vinegar are reserved for traditionally made natural vinegars that require quite an effort to find.
While everything is marketed as natural these days, finding good vinegar for food and body care requires knowing specifics about 1) how it was produced, and 2) what it was produced from. Only in knowing these two things can you be at all certain about its potential for good or bad effects on us and whether or not any health benefits can be expected. White vinegar for example, an excellent household cleaner, defies being food based on these two things. It is usually made from synthetic glacial acetic acid, a petrochemical by-product. Although it contains acetic acid and water, we don't believe it ought to be called vinegar or be sold as food. It is awfully cheap though.
When seeking a food grade healthy vinegar, there is no better choice than Eden traditionally brewed raw vinegars.
Raw Vinegar with Mother
Raw vinegar means that the Mother of Vinegar, aka Mother, has been protected and is still in the vinegar. Organic EDEN Apple Cider Vinegar and Red Wine Vinegar are raw, unpasteurized, and traditionally crafted with no additives or processing aids. Their fruity bouquet, color, and smooth exuberant flavor are achieved through the finest ingredients, skill, and a resolute aging to mellow it. Healthy vinegar contains many beneficial organic acids, friendly bacteria, enzymes, and a wide variety of phytonutrients. Researchers are only now explaining the extensive anecdotal evidence of vinegar's ability to promote overall health. Vinegar's benefits are not from any single component of raw vinegar, but rather from all of its components working in concert. In Organic Eden Apple Cider and Red Wine Vinegars the mother shows as an opacity or cloudiness. The efficacious results of mother fermentation is a valuable complexity within the acetic acid. This is the main reason raw vinegar has a healthy repute.
Ancient Methods produce the Highest Value
Organic EDEN Brown Rice Vinegar is made using methods over one thousand years old. Organic brown rice, koji Aspergillus oryzae, and mountain spring water are placed in earthenware crocks, partially buried outdoors, covered, and fermented for about eight months. Rare today, authentic brown rice vinegar like Eden's is a highly valued health food in Japan. Served with meals at all times of day, its sweetness enhances foods and is essential in making good sushi.
Modern ‘rice vinegar’ is many things targeted at a cheap imitation. Some are synthetic acetic acid, caramel color, refined sugar, GMO enzymes, and chemical additives. These “vinegars” are effectively deceptively labeled with cozy designs and words like natural, organic, etc.
Treasured Brine
EDEN Ume Plum Vinegar is the pickling brine from making the umeboshi plums and has a salty, 4.3% acidity. This blend of organic acids and salty brine has been used for thousands of years as a health food, and to flavor and preserve foods. Its native name is ume su or plum vinegar. Its ruby hue is from red shiso leaf, Perilla frutescens, aka beefsteak leaf. Commercial versions use toxic red dyes. Eden Ume Plum Vinegar contains absolutely no additives of any kind whatsoever. It embodies the wisdom of the ages and the energy and phytonutrients that made ume su so famous.
Amber Glass Protected
All EDEN vinegar, in fact all EDEN oil, fruit juices, tomato sauces, some crushed tomatoes, some concentrates, and our soy sauces, are bottled in dark amber glass to protect flavor and nutrients.
