Is my blue glazed crock safe to make wine vinegar in?
I have an urge to purchase a "vinegar mother" and make homemade vinegar with leftover red wine. According to what I have read, it is not a difficult process, and I have had great success with making kombucha, which is a similar technique, only uses tea and sugar rather than wine. I have a lovely dark blue glazed crock with a spigot at the bottom that would work charmingly, if I could verify that it would be safe to use. Is there any risk of the acid of the vinegar reacting with the glaze? Is there any way to test whether it would or not? Thanks, and any advise on vinegar making is appreciated, as well as good sources for buying a mother.
Best Answer
Acid promotes the leaching of lead from pottery glazes. Of course, not all glazes contain lead. The FDA claims that hardware-store lead test kits work on pottery: How can I find out if my ceramicware are safe?
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How do I know if my homemade vinegar is safe?
When making fermented beverages such as wine, beer or cider, hygiene is very important, but not so much for safety, it's more about taste. So your vinegar should be safe. If it tastes OK, congratulations, you did it! As always, though, if you intend to keep it for a while, you may want to pasteurize it (or freeze it).Is it safe to make vinegar?
The acidity of homemade vinegar varies greatly. If you make your own vinegar, do not use it for canning, for preserving, or for anything that will be stored at room temperature. The vinegar's acidity, or pH level, may not be sufficient to preserve your food and could result in severe food poisoning.How long to make red wine vinegar?
Add 1 cup of mother and an entire bottle (750ml) of red wine to a large glass container. Cover and place out of direct sunlight. Over a 2 to 3 week period, you'll see a "skin" form over the top of the mixture. The skin will eventually sink to the bottom (about 2 weeks) and you'll have vinegar.How do you make white wine vinegar?
How to Make Your Own White Wine VinegarRuling on vinegar made from wine #HUDATV
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Answer 2
It probably won't hurt you, but I wouldn't risk it, just in case. Glazes for food containers are unlikely to contain lead, but may have other metals that are harmful in sufficient quantities. These include cadmium, barium, cobalt, strontium, chromium, and in the case of some older orange ceramic, URANIUM.
Blue glaze is probably copper or cobalt based. I found a reference on ScienceDirect about high blood cobalt levels in association with lead poisoning from glazed Greek earthenware. This indicates that cobalt can indeed be leached out of the glaze and absorbed into the body. Cobalt is eliminated rapidly, but is moderately posionous, and copper is problematic in large quantities. Which brings this back to where I started: it won't kill you, and probably won't make you sick, but it's not really worth the risk.
File it in the same category as eating egg salad left out in the heat a few hours?
One other caution: prolonged contact with acid may damage and discolor your formerly handsome crock, in addition to leaching out these metals. To check for this, you can leave white vinegar in the container for a week or so, checking for change in color of the vinegar and the container every day.
Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
Images: Karolina Grabowska, jamie he, Andrea Piacquadio, Nadia Szopińska