Is there a difference between cooking vinegar and cleaning vinegar

When you visit a grocery store, you'll discover a wide variety of vinegars on the condiments aisle—balsamic vinegar, rice vinegar, apple cider vinegar, red wine vinegar, champagne vinegar, and distilled white vinegar. All of these add brightness and acidity to recipes. Many of us also use vinegar for laundry and cleaning around the house; however, for true cleaning vinegar, you'll need to head to the cleaning products aisle or a hardware store.

What Is Cleaning Vinegar?

The only difference between cleaning vinegar and distilled white vinegar is the level of acidity. They are both made through a process where alcohols are distilled from grain and allowed to ferment as microorganisms process the alcohol into acetic acid and water or vinegar.

The distilled white vinegar you see in the condiment aisle contains around five percent acetic acid and 95 percent water. Cleaning vinegar contains around six percent acetic acid. That doesn't sound like much of a difference, but cleaning vinegar is 20 percent stronger than white distilled vinegar for tackling cleaning chores.

While you can use distilled white vinegar for cleaning, do not use cleaning vinegar for salad dressings or making pickles. The product may contain impurities that are not approved for consumption and the level of acidity is too strong to be tasty.

Warning

If you are purchasing cleaning vinegar at a hardware or large home improvement store, do not confuse it with industrial vinegar. This product is used by professional landscape crews to kill weeds. Industrial vinegar contains up to 20 percent acetic acid and is dangerous for indoor cleaning because of the fumes and because it can permanently damage surfaces.

Why Use Cleaning Vinegar?

Cleaning vinegar is less toxic to the environment and less expensive than many commercial cleaning products. It is highly effective at removing odors and whitening whites in laundry, cutting through tough grime like soap scum, and unclogging sink drains.

With cleaning vinegar, you can make your own cleaning products by diluting it with water or adding some dishwashing liquid and clean nearly every surface around your home.

How to Use Cleaning Vinegar for Laundry

• Cleaning vinegar will help remove tough odors like mildew, urine, cooking odors, and sweat from washable clothes. For a large load of clothes, add just 1/2 cup to the final rinse cycle. Adjust the amount if you are doing a small load of laundry.
• For white, 100 percent cotton items, cleaning vinegar can be used to help remove ground-in soil and brighten the fabrics. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and then remove it from the heat. Add 1 cup of cleaning vinegar and the white socks, underwear, or towels. Let the items soak overnight and rinse well.

How to Use Cleaning Vinegar for Cleaning

• To remove soap scum from ceramic tile, clean porcelain surfaces (tubs and toilets), and dirt from painted woodwork, fill a spray bottle with one part cleaning vinegar, one part dishwashing liquid, and two parts water. Spray onto dirty surfaces and allow to sit for five minutes to begin cutting through the grime and then scrub with a nylon-bristled brush or wipe away with a microfiber cloth.

Tip

When working with cleaning vinegar, wear rubber gloves. The strong acetic acid can cause irritation to skin and nails.

• To unclog slow-running drains, pour at least one quart of boiling water down the drain. In a medium bowl, combine one cup of hot water, one cup of baking soda, and one cup of cleaning vinegar (Warning: there will be fizzing!). Pour the vinegar mixture down the drain and let it work for at least 10 minutes. Finish by flushing the drain with another quart of boiling water.
• For cleaning windows and glass, mix equal parts cleaning vinegar and water in a spray bottle.

When Not to Use Cleaning Vinegar

1. Do not use cleaning vinegar or any type of acid to clean marble, granite, limestone, or any natural stone countertop or floor.
2. Do not use cleaning vinegar to clean cast iron or aluminum pans or surfaces. It can pit the metal.
3. Do not clean knives with cleaning vinegar. It can cause pitting on the thin stainless steel edges. If used at full strength, it can even pit stainless steel appliances.
4. Do not use on finished or waxed wood surfaces. It can remove the finish.
5. Do not use cleaning vinegar, even in a diluted form, on electronic screens like televisions and laptops. The acid can damage the anti-glare properties.

To get a better understanding of the different types of vinegar, as well as the taste, smell, and utility of each one, let’s first take a Bill Nye the Science Guy approach and look at what vinegar actually is from a chemistry standpoint.

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The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health describes vinegar as “a combination of acetic acid and water made by a two-step fermentation process.” The first step of this process is when yeast feeds on the sugar or starch that comes from the natural water in foods like fruits, potatoes, or rice. The liquid that results from that ferments into alcohol. Then in the second step, the alcohol and acetic acid are exposed to oxygen, allowing it all to ferment again over weeks or months to form vinegar. The acetic acid is what causes the strong smells and tartness we commonly associate with vinegar.

Cleaning, cooking, and pickling. Does one magical liquid do it all, or is there technically a difference between the three? And what happens if you use one for a different purpose?

Cooking vinegar

Harvard’s Nutrition Source names distilled white vinegar, white wine vinegar, red wine vinegar, apple cider vinegar, balsamic vinegar, and rice vinegar as some of the most common consumable types. The most versatile of the six is distilled white vinegar. This type serves as a sort of blank canvas, as the taste is neutral and it can be used for all three purposes (cooking, cleaning, and pickling).

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Many of the other types of vinegar have additions like herbs and fruit juices, which set them apart from plain white vinegar. You can find vinegar in everything from salad dressings to meat marinades, but there are a number of different vinegars with different flavors within the cooking category.

Harvard experts note that vinegar can change the texture of foods, not just the flavor. When used as a marinade, vinegar breaks down the chemical structure of protein, which tenderizes it. You can also make cottage cheese by adding vinegar to milk because the acid in vinegar separates curds from the liquid whey.

Cleaning vinegar

Per the above, white distilled vinegar is the type of vinegar that people often use for both cleaning and cooking. However, some brands market vinegar specifically as a cleaning product. This raises the question: What is the difference between those products and the bottle in my pantry? The answer is not much other than the concentration of the acid in it.

Apartment Therapy explains that the distilled white vinegar used in cooking contains about a 4-5% concentration that makes it safer for consumption versus the 6-75% concentration found in cleaning vinegar. So to put it plainly, cooking vinegar can be used to clean, but cleaning vinegar should not be consumed. The low concentration of white cooking vinegar is strong enough to kill some household bacteria but not all. Experts say it works well on removing soap scum in sinks, drains, and shower stalls.

Pickling vinegar

Once again, because it is the most neutral of the vinegars, distilled white is considered the best for pickling foods. However, other types of vinegar like apple cider (fruity and sweeter than most vinegar) can be used for pickling. It all depends on the flavor you’re looking for. As previously mentioned, vinegar has a concentration that can help kill bacteria. Combine that with water, salt, and sugar and you get a brine solution that can extend the shelf life of some foods. This is called pickling. The vinegar used in pickling can be the same as that used in cooking, so the concentration of acid remains around 4-5%.

Of vinegar’s many abilities I have to say that pickling is my favorite. The mighty pickle, my favorite snack, would be nothing without the liquid that gives it its essence. Hopefully, these distinctions save you from ruining your carpet or lead you to the perfect pickle. I can only dream.

Is cleaning vinegar the same as cooking vinegar?

Does it matter what kind of vinegar you use for cleaning?

Can I use kitchen vinegar for cleaning?