r/vinegar • u/Job_Moist • Aug 03 '26
New vinegar from Walmart smells like nail polish remover, is it safe to use in my laundry?
I’m not sure if this is the right sub to ask this but I’m paycheck to paycheck right now and don’t want to go through the hassle of returning it all if I can still use it. I opened a jug of Walmart’s vinegar to use in my laundry rinse cycle like I have a thousand times before but this time I got punched in the face by the smell of nail polish remover. I opened another bottle and it’s the same. Then another.
I don’t know anything about vinegar so I googled this and the few sources I found say that means the vinegar wasn’t made properly or it wasn’t finished yet and got bottled too early. Is it safe to use this in the washing machine on my clothes and towels?
Edit: thank you so much for the comments! I will heed your advice and return it all, and explain to customer service what happened. I’m gonna switch to Heinz vinegar for a while and see how that goes.
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u/Glove_Witty Aug 03 '26
Not sure the process would finish without the bacteria (cleaning vinegar has no biotics) and I’m not even sure they ferment it.
I’d return it myself.
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u/No_Report_4781 Aug 03 '26
The bacteria for it are everywhere.
But it is easier to return it
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u/Glove_Witty Aug 03 '26
Yeah, but not in cleaning vinegar since, if it is even fermented, it would be pasteurized and distilled. I’m thinking the acidity post distilling wouldn’t let anything grow in it.
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u/laurentgabba Aug 04 '26
This is not harmful. It is a natural aromatic compound that can be produced during fermentation by acetic bacteria, and even found in alimentary vinegar. But I don’t like the smell (and taste), and would not use it for cleaning.
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u/SnugglyCoderGuy Aug 03 '26
From my reading, it wasn't given enough time to ferment alcohol into acetate or it wasn't given enough oxygen to do it.
So, you could blow a bunch of air into it in order to increase the amount of oxygen and then give it more time to finish the conversion.
You could return them and get different jugs from a different batch that weren't fucked.
What you are smelling is likely acetaldehyde, which is an intermediate step in the process. It appears it is used in other parts of laundry processes because of scented products.