Scrapping your apples. Actually, not scrapping your apples. Making use of apple scraps

Does anyone else get the sense that the whole foodie/food blogging culture is just another way for people to be pretentious?

[*gasp*]

[oh no she di'in't]

[oh yes she di'id]

Here's the thing. I may have mentioned before that I've been trying, quite purposely, to get into food fermentation. It's allegedly good for you, and cures everything from bad digestion to death. So I've been slowly starting off making saurkraut and sourdough and whatnot, and recently I joined a fermentation group on Facebook. It comes up quite frequently in my feed, and usually is interesting and features pictures of things you really wouldn't want to eat.

So most recently, this innocent guy or gal comes along, and asked a question about whether it's ok to weight his food down with something on top of bamboo sticks. (You're supposed to submerge food under water to prevent mould and encourage the right kind of bacterial growth.) IMMEDIATELY a bunch of snobby foodies jump down this poster's throat with a chorus of 'nooooo how cooould you use bamboo you MUST buy snootie Foodie Fermentation Weights that are specially made from a tree that only grows in the depths of the Amazon!' and 'you're going to promote mould and DIE!'

All this because the poor person wanted to use sticks to get his or her food submerged under water.

Fortunately the voice of reason came along and others pointed out that yes, you could use bamboo, they've been doing it for years and haven't died yet. But it just kind of drove a point home for me, that as much as I'd like to believe that food fermentation is a way of preserving food, and maybe spending less money and being more thrifty and just, in general, doing things that are maybe good for the planet, maybe good for you, but what's for sure, isn't harming anyone - even that can be turned into a white privilege, snooty, blogger-speak, clickbaity, everything that is wrong with the world kind of thing.

Less snootiness, more not doing harm to others, nkay?

On this note, I will give you a recipe for vinegar. Yes, actual vinegar. That you can make from fruit scraps. That I'm not entirely sure how to do it yet, but I'm working on it, it's not perfect, I'm not perfect, but at least we do no harm.

Apple Scrap Vinegar

(comes from this website, which is way prettier and looks like they know what they're doing way better than me. Really you should go there. Go here if you want the short-hand version, and enjoy the way I write things. Go there if you actually want to see pictures and make sure you're doing it right.)

Materials needed

• apples (or other fruit? Apparently?)
• sugar
• water
• jar
• cheesecloth or other cloth
• rubber bands 

1. Use apples in some other application. (Apple pie, apple sauce, etc.)
2. Keep the cores and the peels
3. Stick cores and peels into jar. 
4. Cover with sugar-water at a ratio of 1 tbs sugar:2 liters water 
5. Cover jars with cheesecloth and rubber bands so that fruit flies don't get in and lay eggs. That would be gross. 
6. Stir several times a day until it starts bubbling, then once a day for 1-3 weeks. I like using chopsticks for this. It fits well and it doesn't make a mess.
7. Strain out the fruit, put the liquid back into the jar. Bottle when there is no more fizzing. Keeps for up to a year. 
8. Enjoy. You just beat the system. Congratulations, you now have less white privilege. Or maybe more. GAA!!!!