# What is white vinegar made from? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 24, 2002, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389 "2002-04-24T17:07:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2017, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/21 "2017-04-14T10:33:54Z")
> [@3waygeek](#): > > The bottle in my fridge says 5 percent. I am puzzled - why keep what is essentially a preservative, in the fridge? We keep tomato sauce and salad cream in the fridge (for no really good reason) but not vinegar. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2017, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/22 "2017-04-14T10:41:44Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > I am puzzled - why keep what is essentially a preservative, in the fridge? We keep tomato sauce and salad cream in the fridge (for no really good reason) but not vinegar. Probably wants to muffle the sound of the bottle constantly saying “5 percent.” That shit can get annoying. On a more serious note, I seemed to remember from long ago vinegar forming a film on top that my grandmother called mother. Turns out this [wasn’t](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother_of_vinegar) one of those insane confabulated things. ---
**Author:** ![Ambivalid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a5b964/32.png) [@Ambivalid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ambivalid)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2017, 10:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/23 "2017-04-14T10:55:30Z")
So, hehe, um can you drink it? :o ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2017, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/24 "2017-04-14T12:22:36Z")
While you can make acetic acid from petroleum sources, I don’t think you’re legally allowed to call the resulting product “vinegar”. If all you’re using it for is cleaning and middle-school science projects, though, it shouldn’t make a difference. ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2017, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/25 "2017-04-14T13:54:06Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > I wasn’t being sarcastic, if that’s what you’re implying. It’s a factual answer to a factual question and I’m still around to read it 15 years later. It’s all good. The patience of Job … ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2017, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/26 "2017-04-14T15:25:37Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Probably wants to muffle the sound of the bottle constantly saying “5 percent.” That shit can get annoying. > > On a more serious note, I seemed to remember from long ago vinegar forming a film on top that my grandmother called mother. Turns out this [wasn’t](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother_of_vinegar) one of those insane confabulated things. Yeah, I have vague memories of vinegar developing a mother back in the 80s, but I haven’t seen it since. Well, actually, that might not be true. I think there was a bottle of unfiltered apple cider with the selling point that the mother was in it that I bought a decade ago, but I can’t remember any spontaneously formed mother from regular commercial vinegar since the 80s. ---
**Author:** ![chorpler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chorpler/32/2888_2.png) [@chorpler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorpler)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/27 "2017-04-15T04:39:16Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Probably wants to muffle the sound of the bottle constantly saying “5 percent.” That shit can get annoying. > > On a more serious note, I seemed to remember from long ago vinegar forming a film on top that my grandmother called mother. Turns out this [wasn’t](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother_of_vinegar) one of those insane confabulated things. I initially read this as “forming a film on top of my grandmother” and I was greatly unnerved. ---
**Author:** ![JacobSwan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@JacobSwan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JacobSwan)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2017, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/28 "2017-04-16T07:45:26Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > While you can make acetic acid from petroleum sources, I don’t think you’re legally allowed to call the resulting product “vinegar”. If all you’re using it for is cleaning and middle-school science projects, though, it shouldn’t make a difference. My mother always refused to have vinegar on her chips from the chip shop. She said that the stuff they used wasn’t ‘real’ and was a by product from the oil industry. Are you saying that there was a grain (ha!) of truth in her foible? (I still only get salt on my chips and put my own vinegar on when I get home. But I do it because the vinegar soaks through the paper and makes the car smell funny.) ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2017, 9:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389/29 "2017-04-16T09:03:43Z")
In the UK, there is a vinegar divide. If you buy fish and chips in the south, you will be offered malt vinegar; in the North it will be white. In some places there is a choice. In the supermarket, most pickled onions are in malt. The exception is those tiny white ones some people put in cocktails. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-white-vinegar-made-from/105389.md?page=1)