For sure the history of the origin of vinegar is unknown, but thanks to archaeologists, we know that the product was popular for many thousands of years before our era. Antique healers used it as a remedy, beauties of those times were used as cosmetic, cooks as a preservative. What is the benefit and harm of vinegar and how it is used - we will discuss today.
Description
Grape vinegar is a natural product that is obtained from grape wine as a result of fermentation of the product (in simple words, it is a soured wine). After it is kept in oak wood barrels. The end result is a liquid with a strong odor and a sour taste of different degrees of saturation.
Learn how to make wine from grapes at home and what grape varieties are best for making wine.
Produce several varieties of the product: white, red and balsamic. The third product is the most expensive, since the process of its preparation takes the most time and requires special technologies, however, its characteristics are different: the liquid is thicker, similar to syrup, and the taste has some sweetness. 
How to get
At home, you can apply the simplest recipe: heat a dry white wine, evaporating it to a reduction in volume by half, without boiling.
The second way.
- The pulp from squeezed grapes is placed in a glass jar, covered with sugar and filled with water. Proportions: per 800 grams of product liter of water and 100 grams of sugar.
- The neck of the container is tied with gauze and put in a dark and warm place for fermentation for two weeks. During this time, the liquid is shaken to saturate with oxygen.
- After two weeks of fermentation, the liquid is filtered, pressing a thick mass. In the resulting brag add another 100 grams of sugar and leave to complete the process. Cooking time takes from forty to sixty days.
The product is ready when it has brightened and stopped wandering.
- It is filtered and bottled with a sealed cork.
Composition and nutritional value
- Vitamins: A, B3, B5, C.
- Macronutrients: sodium, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, calcium.
- Trace elements: fluorine, chlorine, zinc, manganese, iron.
- Organic acids: lactic, acetic, tartaric.
- Phenolic compounds.
- Antioxidants.
- proteins: 0.04 g;
- Fat: 0 g;
- carbohydrate: 0.27 g;
- caloric content: 9 kcal.
Did you know? The analogue of a modern battery existed about two thousand years ago. In 1936, the German archaeologist Wilhelm König discovered a curious discovery during excavations near Baghdad: a clay jug with bitumen cork in the neck, through which an iron rod wrapped with copper wire passed, and inside the jug - remnants of a liquid resembling vinegar. In the course of the experiment conducted by American scientists, it turned out that grape vinegar played the role of electrolyte. A copy of such a device, made by the Americans, produced electricity at 0.5 volts.
The benefits of vinegar
Due to the rich vitamin-mineral composition, the presence of acids and antioxidants, grape vinegar has a wide range of positive effects on the body.
- Promotes regeneration of the mucous membranes of the stomach, intestines.
- Promotes the production of enzymes that improve the processes of digestion.
- Improves metabolic processes, regulates cholesterol levels.
- Strengthens bone and muscle tissue, hair, nails.
- It supports the protective functions of the body.
- It reduces the risk of anemia, increases the level of hemoglobin.
- Improves the elasticity of the walls of blood vessels, clears cholesterol deposits.
- It has a regenerating, wound-healing, anti-inflammatory effect.
- Restores strength, improves brain function.
- Supports the heart muscle.
- Promotes the production of sex hormones.
Other grape products also have useful properties: raisins, grape juice. Do not neglect the grape seeds, which slow down the aging process and stimulate the regenerative functions of the body.
The product is used for diseases of the rectum, skin diseases, gout, obesity, chronic fatigue, cold. As a preventive measure, it is used to reduce the risk of atherosclerosis.
Grape Vinegar Harm
Given the large amount of acid, the product can damage health if it is consumed excessively. When abused, vinegar can cause heartburn and unpleasant belching, increase acidity in the stomach, thereby causing irritation of its mucous membrane. This moment is fraught with diseases of the digestive tract.
The same acids and phenolic compounds can provoke a negative reaction in allergy sufferers, both when used internally and externally. Before use, people who are prone to allergies should be tested for tolerability.
After drinking grape vinegar, it is advisable to rinse the oral cavity, since the effect of acid on tooth enamel is destructive. 
Misconception that ingestion with cystitis kills bacteria in the ureter. The decay products of acids only exacerbate the inflammatory process, delaying the treatment of the disease.
Important! You can not leave grape vinegar in a place accessible to small children: it can burn the insides, up to death.
The use of grape vinegar in cooking
Popular use of "soured wine" as a marinade for meat and poultry, mushrooms, as well as canning for the winter.
Add the wine ingredient in dressings to salads, seafood and herring, to give a spicy note - in vegetable side dishes, borscht, snacks, sauces and gravies.
If you add sugar to the product, you can replace it with wine in the recipe, when baking for pomp in the dough they add soda, slaked vinegar, and wine is quite suitable for this. Grape vinegar goes well with vegetables, fish, meat and poultry, herbs and spices, balsamic is used even in desserts.
Check out the best varieties of early, nutmeg, white, table, pink, cold-resistant, technical grapes.
There are products with which it is not combined. Vinegar with milk and sour-milk drinks and cottage cheese, with legumes and wheat, with potato dishes can lead to undesirable reactions. Sharing can cause bloating and flatulence.
In folk medicine
In folk recipes, the product is used to alleviate the condition. gout. The disease is provoked by salt deposits, which dissolve under the action of acid. Make an acetic compress from a thick cloth moistened with liquid, and leave it overnight, securing it with an elastic bandage, but not tight, so that there is good blood circulation.
With throat diseases Rinsing with vinegar will help destroy the bacteria that have settled on the mucous membrane, and you will need to dilute it with water to avoid getting burned. With a strong temperature Acetic wiping is used, diluting the product with water at room temperature. The same wiping the legs will help get rid of fatigue, will give tone to the venous vessels, reducing the risk varicose veins. Cold vinegar compresses will heal the cracks and soothe inflammation during hemorrhoids.
For the treatment of hemorrhoids use a swimsuit, wheatgrass creeping, raspberry.
One tablespoon of the product, diluted in a glass of boiled water, will help improve bowel function. Take this medicine for two weeks, half a cup twice a day before meals. 
For diseases of the gastrointestinal tract, sage, kalanchoe is used.
Used product and homemade cosmetics. It tones and cleanses the skin, saturates with useful substances, has an antiseptic and regenerating effect.
To improve the condition of oily skin and clean it, apply acetic compress. Prepare a base with slots for eyes and mouth from folded gauze. Heat the vinegar liquid to a room temperature in a water bath, soak a gauze base in it and put on face for 15 minutes. After rinse with warm water. The procedure should not be carried out more than twice a month.
Important! Remember: on irritated and dry skin, such a compress is not desirable, it can dry out the top layer of the epidermis and cause peeling and redness.
By adding a few drops to the face masks, you can achieve the effect of lightening, narrowing the pores, healing of microcracks. For whitening use white liquid.
When caring for hair, the product will add shine to it and will help to glue the split ends. Modern hair cleaners contain alkali, which can cause peeling of the scalp. Acetic rinsing after washing will smooth out this negative effect. Be sure to dilute with boiled water: concentrated acetic acid will give unpleasant sensations. 
Women over thirty face the problem of loss of elasticity of the skin. Relaxing, toning and tightening effect will have a bath with grape vinegar. Add a liter of product to the warm water and lie in it for about 20 minutes, then take a slightly warm shower. The procedure, carried out twice a week, will also help get rid of excessive sweating.
Did you know? Balsamic vinegar got its name in the Renaissance. Then it was used (and very successfully) as a balm to fight sore throat.
Contraindications
The use of foods with a high content of acid is contraindicated in the following diseases and conditions:
- lactation;
- age up to 16 years;
- gastritis;
- increased acidity;
- gastric and duodenal ulcer:
- grape allergy;
- cystitis;
- hypertension;
- gallbladder disease.
The properties of vinegar, of course, are useful, but we should not forget about the dangers of the concentrated product. You should not eat it often, and before medical treatment it is advisable to consult a doctor in order not to aggravate possible existing health problems.
