Sweet black vinegar

Glutinous rice vinegar cooked down with slab sugar, dark and sweet-sour rather than sharp. It is what 豬腳薑 is made in: ginger, pork trotter and eggs braised in it until tender, and the pot mellows the longer it is kept. Cantonese families make it by the bucket and eat it for a month.

TCM properties

Nature · warming　Flavour · sweet、sour　Meridians · liver、stomach

Traditional food therapy

The tradition holds that sweet vinegar warms the stomach and opens the appetite; it is the most recognisable flavour of the month after a birth.

Cautions: read first

• Take care if you have reflux or a stomach ulcer.
• Cook it in clay, not aluminium; vinegar attacks the metal.

Preparation

Straight from the bottle into the pot; it is not diluted.

Origin

Guangdong, where old houses like Haitian and Zhimeizhai are the common labels. Bottled at Australian Asian grocers; the confinement grade is labelled 添丁甜醋

Availability in Australia

Common at Asian grocers

Pairs well with