Producer
Vim & Vinegar
Address: 1227 Modoc Street Walla Walla, WA, 99362
Phone: 509-876-2681
Website: https://vimandvinegar.com
About Us
Vinegar: What wine and cider want to be. In 2013, my wife Kristen and I moved to Walla Walla from Denver so that I could attend Walla Walla Community College’s hands-on Enology and Viticulture program. Like all students, I was encouraged to start making wine right away. My early attempts were, by winemaking standards, not so successful. Soon, my organic, "sulfite-free" wine began to form a thin film on its surface (known as mother-of-vinegar) and tasted, well, a lot like vinegar. For some students, these would have been simple mistakes; for me, they were my first steps toward Vim & Vinegar.
By my second year, I knew I was not on the traditional winemaking path - I was hooked on vinegar. In wine sensory classes, I'd taste some of the world’s most highly-regarded wines and think: "this is really good. I wonder how it'd be as vinegar?" It’s safe to say that I was a black sheep of the program.
Bringing craft vinegar to the Walla Walla Valley. Walla Walla is the perfect place to source the best ingredients for Vim & Vinegar’s craft products. Which is why our first product, Rufous Red Wine Vinegar, is made from the region’s finest wines (Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Syrah).
But the path here was winding. Winemaking programs, after all, teach you how not to make vinegar. So I reverse-engineered the winemaking process and learned everything I could about the venerable art of vinegar making by reading centuries-old translations of long-dead French and Italian writers and seeking the advice of artisans across North America and Europe. And, most importantly, I learned by trial and error. My steep learning curve involved making vinegar out of many grape varietals, as well as wild raspberries, blueberries, apples, pineapple, teas (kombucha), and honey. If it has sugar in it, the chances are that I've made vinegar out of it.
Along the way, I learned a lot about chemistry of vinegar, its history and its processes - and about patience. Only superior wine can make superior vinegar. And only time can make superior vinegar truly exceptional. There’s no shortcut.
By my second year, I knew I was not on the traditional winemaking path - I was hooked on vinegar. In wine sensory classes, I'd taste some of the world’s most highly-regarded wines and think: "this is really good. I wonder how it'd be as vinegar?" It’s safe to say that I was a black sheep of the program.
Bringing craft vinegar to the Walla Walla Valley. Walla Walla is the perfect place to source the best ingredients for Vim & Vinegar’s craft products. Which is why our first product, Rufous Red Wine Vinegar, is made from the region’s finest wines (Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Syrah).
But the path here was winding. Winemaking programs, after all, teach you how not to make vinegar. So I reverse-engineered the winemaking process and learned everything I could about the venerable art of vinegar making by reading centuries-old translations of long-dead French and Italian writers and seeking the advice of artisans across North America and Europe. And, most importantly, I learned by trial and error. My steep learning curve involved making vinegar out of many grape varietals, as well as wild raspberries, blueberries, apples, pineapple, teas (kombucha), and honey. If it has sugar in it, the chances are that I've made vinegar out of it.
Along the way, I learned a lot about chemistry of vinegar, its history and its processes - and about patience. Only superior wine can make superior vinegar. And only time can make superior vinegar truly exceptional. There’s no shortcut.