O Zinfandel Vinegar is among the 13 specialty wine vinegars made by the California-based O Olive Oil company. I'm not a big vinegar fan, as vinegar in any but the smallest of doses makes me sick. But I keep some on hand to use sparingly in salad dressings. I tried O Zinfandel red wine vinegar a few years ago after it had placed first in America's Test Kitchen's Gourmet Red Wine Vinegar taste test. I've also seen Jacques Pepin use it on his cooking shows. It's a sweet vinegar, which Americans tend to prefer, very different from harsh super-acidic European vinegars. This is vinegar, though, so it's not sweet in the syrupy sense. It has a sharp, well-balanced flavor that is unusually rich by vinegar standards, with hints of cherry. This is how O Olive Oil describes it:"Handmade in small batches in the Orleans method and aged in oak barrels for over two years. Smoky spice and voluptuous cherry notes emerge from old vine California grapes in this artisan vinegar."
The description of the flavor is about right, but it needn't be as pretentious as it sounds. Use O Zinfandel in anything that calls for red wine vinegar, or just drizzle it on greens or vegetables. It's especially good in dishes that contain onions, as it balances out the sharpness. In case you're wondering, the Orleans method of making vinegar was the first commercial method developed. A small amount of vinegar containing the mother bacteria is added to a cask of red wine. After a few months, the vinegar is moved to another barrel for aging. O Zinfandel is aged in oak barrels for 2 years, at which point bing cherry juice is added, before aging another 6 months. Ingredients are: aged zinfandel vinegar and bing cherries. Acidity is 6%, and it contains sulfites.
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