Aceto Balsamico di Modena is one of the most popular Italian products around the world. When I used to live abroad, in Northern Europe, I’d find it as an ingredient in a bit of everything from salad to sandwiches, and in every supermarket. It was almost strange because, when I had left Italy, aceto balsamico wasn’t much of a thing, at least where I came from.

That doesn’t mean that vinegar in general wasn’t a staple on our daily table. Indeed, aceto is an ancient thing, if you think that its creation enabled the hunter-gatherer communities of prehistory to preserve food for longer and, therefore, to abandon their nomadic lifestyle in favor of a more stable, agriculture-based way of living.