What happened to my homemade date vinegar?

Not babbling at all; it makes perfect sense to me!

Fridge will stop all action. It needs to stay room temp. I still think you only have wine and need to add the mother and get it to the next phase. It is hard without tasting or really seeing. Just have to take the chance and see. The one thing I have learn in life is the many ways one should not do something. . . then when you get it right, you know much more about the product then if you didn't bugger it up many times along the way. Getting it prefect the first time makes it more difficult to get it right the second time. Sorry, just babbling on. . . .

It is a cloudy caramel color. I did put it in the frig after opening it last night. Do you think adding some Bragg's at this point and leaving it out at room temp may still work, or did refrigerating it ruin my chances at creating a nice date vinegar? Obviously I am a novice at this and probably should have done a tad more reading before jumping into it. Thanks again for your assistance usuba dashi.

It sounds as if you are only at the alcohol fermentation stage, hence the carbonation. Matterization is when wine oxidizes, like fruit turning brown when left out after you cut it. I have a feeling you were either tasting acid from the wine or matterization. Did the wine loose its clarity> What color is it now?

I threw some distilled water and medjool dates in a glass container, covered with cheesecloth, removed dates after about a week and then let it go approx. 4 more weeks before straining and putting in a bottle. I did not add a mother but it did create its own. It does taste vinegary while and also still a tad sweet. It tasted "done" to me. I just assumed that my fruit would turn to wine and then to vinegar. Can you explain "matterizes" please? Thanks usuba dashi! I also added sugar to the date/water mixture.

You need to explain the procedure you used to make your fruit vinegar. . . it will be easier to figure out your problem. My guess is you are still in the alcoholic fermentation phase of producing the wine. To create the acetic fermentation, you may need a mother to inoculate the fruit wine, after it finishes its fermentation. Wine doesn't always turn to vinegar, sometimes it just matterizes. Buy a small bottles of Bragg's cider vinegar, which has plenty of mother in it to add to the wine (just a wee bit, won't take much) to assure a good start towards the acetic phase.