silly question alert.... pickled onions

[Shirley]

Can you reuse the vinegar that you have pickled onions in??? I bought some really scrummy ones and they were all eaten in one sitting...

Bought some previously and didn't refrigerate the jar after they had all gone and the vinegar went slimy on the top (is that mother of vinegar and is it safe to use from a jar of spicy pickles?)

[Millymollymandy]

I don't think that's a silly question but it's obviously a hard question cos I see that no-one knows the answer! (Me neither!).

It might be worth asking Luath as I think she knows everything there is to know about preserving etc.

[Andy Hamilton]

The jar needs to fully seal and it helps if you steralise the jar and boil the vinegar.

If you put them straight back in then (I think) bacteria has already got into the jar and it will cause stuff to go off quickly.

Might be wrong but that is my understanding of it.

[Jo]

I've not got as far as the onions yet this year but I've tried re-using the vinegar in past years. I find that the onions don't keep so well. But I'm saving hard and don't like wasting anything so what I do now is to re-boil the vinegar, sterilise the jars again (as suggested by Andy) and carry on. I mark the jars which have re-cycled vinegar in them and make sure we use those first. If we miss one of the marked jars and come to it later, then the onions are always a bit soggy.

We like to use ex-pickled onion vinegar on chips and salads too so there is not always a lot to re-use.

Jo