Making and/or Using Vinegar Powder

[Smithy]

Over in this topic about Alton Brown, a brand-new (to me) concept popped up: vinegar powder. @weinoo noted that Wylie Dufresne had been making and using it for quite some time, but I'd never heard of it before today. Bless her, @blue_dolphin posted a link to an article about it, with a recipe. The article, in Taste, is Vinegar: Now in Powder Form. The recipe is for Salt and Vinegar String Beans, excerpted with permission from the Superiority Burger Cookbook.

 

Well. I liked the idea of ordering vinegar powder, but I liked even better the idea of taking stale bread, soaking it in vinegar, drying it in a low oven, then grinding it. I especially liked it because I had half of loaf of once-excellent sourdough that has languished in a bag atop the refrigerator, waiting to become bread crumbs. I liked it even better because of the recipe for Salt and Vinegar String Beans. I love summer green beans, and I had just bought a couple of pounds.

 

How low should the oven temperature be, and for how long? I didn't know, and the article didn't say. Which vinegar might be best? It sounded like cook's choice, although the recipe in question called for malt vinegar. I divvied up the bread loaf into 4 sections for taste comparisons: malt vinegar, white wine vinegar, apple cider vinegar and red wine vinegar.

 

"Low oven" is pretty vague. Once the bread was well-soaked I pulled it apart and spread it onto carefully-segregated baking sheets. Two small pans' worth (the red wine vinegar and apple cider vinegar) went into my Cuisinart Steam Oven using convection bake mode. After 2 hours at 150F they were barely drying. I turned the bread, gave it another 2 hours at 175F, and then again another 2 hours. In the meantime, the breads from the other two vinegars went onto standard baking sheets in my standard oven, at 200F of convective baking. That process took around 2 hours. Note to self: in future, use 200F and use the higher air flow of the larger oven.

 

The top picture is of the original stale bread portions, getting their bath. The bottom picture is of the dried bread crumbs. They'll meet the food processor on another day, to be ground into smithereens and give interesting taste notes to foods. I'm looking forward to trying the green bean recipe in the next day or two.

 

 

Who else has tried this? Got any successes, failures or insights to report? 

Edited August 26, 2019 by Smithy
Corrected "DuFresne" to "Dufresne" (log)

[weinoo]

This article might be fun for you...

 

https://www.wired.com/2009/01/superfoods/

[donk79]

I ran across vinegar powder in a spice shop last month.  When I saw it, I remembered reading about a Modernist technique using maltodextrin.  I most likely read about it on Egullet somewhere.  Sure enough, that is what the commercial powder contained.

My suspicion is that the maltodextrin probably allows for a more concentrated product.  But I also suspect that your method may provide a more palatable product.  The sourdough especially intrigues me!  Regarding temperature, you can most likely get away with higher temperatures early.  As things get drier, I think you would want to go lower.  Some vinegars have a fair amount of sugar in them still.  Carmelization of the sugars and Maillard reactions in the bread are both possibilities, for better or worse!

[Maison Rustique]

Who knew! This is all new to me, too. I definitely need to give it a try!! Thanks for posting this!

[kayb]

I bet it would be an excellent way to make croutons, too.

 

[gfweb]

So that Taste article talks about boiling vinegar with baking soda. Even without the boiling part it will neutralize the acid, right? What is going on here? Has anyone here actually done t his method?

 

Maltodextrin I understand.

[Smithy]

17 hours ago, gfweb said:

So that Taste article talks about boiling vinegar with baking soda. Even without the boiling part it will neutralize the acid, right? What is going on here? Has anyone here actually done t his method?

 

I wondered the same thing. 

[liuzhou]

Maybe I'm missing something, but what is the advantage of "dried vinegar" over a spash of the wet stuff?

[Smithy]

2 minutes ago, liuzhou said:

Maybe I'm missing something, but what is the advantage of "dried vinegar" over a spash of the wet stuff?

 

The powder adds an acid kick without dampening a crisp crust and making it go soggy, according to the article.

[liuzhou]

1 minute ago, Smithy said:

 

The powder adds an acid kick without dampening a crisp crust and making it go soggy, according to the article.

 

Thanks.

 

You'd have to add a hell of a lot of vinegar to make the  crust damp though, surely.

 

I often use amchur (dried green mango) to dishes for a sour note.

[blue_dolphin]

1 hour ago, liuzhou said:

You'd have to add a hell of a lot of vinegar to make the  crust damp though, surely.

 

If I remember correctly, a perceived issue was that the crumb mixture with a bit of liquid vinegar failed to adhere to the green beans in the way that a dusting of completely dry powder did. 

 

1 hour ago, liuzhou said:

I often use amchur (dried green mango) to dishes for a sour note.

 

Clearly, many good ways to tart up a dish!

[Duvel]

20 hours ago, gfweb said:

So that Taste article talks about boiling vinegar with baking soda. Even without the boiling part it will neutralize the acid, right? What is going on here? Has anyone here actually done t his method?

 

Maltodextrin I understand.

Essentially, you are making sodium acetate. A salt, and it can be obtained as a dry powder.

 

Once hydrated, it dissolves partly and inthat process releases small amounts of acetic acid, which - in conjunction with the other absorbed flavour components - created that vinegar “feeling”.

 

Sodium acetate is the main flavouring for salt & vinegar potato crisps.