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Worrying about distilled vinegars and grain-based alcohols has not been at
the very tip-top of my list, because my understanding from conversations with
people in the vinegar industry and at the Vinegar Institute was that the base
grain for distilled vinegars was corn due to its competitive price in the
commodity market.  I understand that the price of corn is rising quickly and
that ethanol is now being made from BARLEY because corn is getting too
pricey.   NOW, I am beginning to worry.
 
But it brings back an old, very old awakening dream of mine:  If only someone
would do some tests to tell us what, exactly, survives distillation in a
commercial setting.  How nice it would be to know for sure that the gliadin
fraction does or does not survive the process.  How nice it would be to know
for sure that colors and flavors extracted with alcohol do or do not contain
remnants of our forbidden proteins.  Dr. Donald Campbell (Canadian Celiac
Assoc.) had done some publishing on this very topic and the Canadians seem to
feel that nothing harmful to us survives distillation.
 
Joanne Hameister
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