Hmmm.......
It turned out that the cider vinegar, but not the malt vinegar, had a big impact, reducing the amount of sugar in the volunteers' blood by 36% over 90 minutes.
Drinking dilute apple cider vinegar appeared to bring blood sugar levels down
This could be because the acetic acid in the cider vinegar suppresses the breakdown of starches, which means that if you consume it before a carb-rich meal, less sugar will get absorbed. We expected the malt vinegar to have a similar effect to the cider vinegar, but in our small study it didn't
So it obviously wasn't the acetic acid, was it? So it must have been something else in the cider vinegar.
I think MM's experiment might have had more value if he had carried on and tested his volunteers' response to eating their bagels after drinking diluted apple juice, diluted orange juice or even plain water.
As for the cholesterol result, reducing the levels by 13% in people whose cholesterol isn't already raised above 'normal' levels doesn't mean that the same result will be achieved in people whose cholesterol is high. If someone's level is 9, reducing it by 13% would only bring it down to around 7.8 anyway, and they would still probably be advised to take statins.
I'm not a big fan of MM as you might realise! 