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Vanilla Recipes Getting hungry? If you search our Recipe pages for recipes with the ingredient "vanilla," you'll find almost 150 choices. Whether you want to start your day with Blueberry Bean Muffins, make a special snack like Carob Chip Cookies or Beananza bars, celebrate with a Carrot Cake, or get fancy with a Broiled Goat Cheese Salad with Raspberry Vinaigrette, our top quality vanilla will give it just the right touch. Since we have had a number of customer questions about kahlua, here's a recipe for this popular coffee liquor. |
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Vanillas to Avoid Coumarin-Adulterated Vanilla One fraud to be especially aware of and avoid is vanilla (usually "bargain" priced) that has been adulterated with coumarin. Coumarin is derived from the tonka bean (Dipteryx ordorata ) that grows on a tree native to Brazil. Because it's cheap and some of its constituents are similar to those in pure vanilla, is often added to vanillas from Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. It adds a strong vanilla-like aroma but little flavor. Coumarin is known to cause liver damage and is a potential carcinogen, and has been banned as a food ingredient by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the United States since 1954. Extract adulterated with coumarin still comes into this country, usually through Mexico where it is not illegal. Imitation Vanilla Pure vanilla is expensive. In order to make the product (or, more correctly, something like the product) more affordable, imitation vanilla was developed. Imitation vanilla is made from artificial flavorings, the two most common sources of which are lignin vanillin, a by-product of the paper industry that is chemically treated to taste like vanilla, and ethyl vanillin, a coal-tar derivative. Vanilla Flavor (WONF) This indication that the product is made With Other Natural Flavors means that the product contains other flavor ingredients, usually Essential oils and botanical extracts. Any of these blended flavors won't, of course, have the taste profile of real vanilla and synthetic chemical carriers can sometimes be introduced. But even if the additions are natural, at best you have an inferior vanilla that is "boosted" with less expensive components. |
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True Vanilla Taste The flavor of true vanilla is the result of a complex mixture of flavor and fragrance constituents. The reason real vanilla has a richer, deeper, more complex and satisfying flavor than a synthetic flavor is that the synthetic is artificially "built" around vanillin, simplifying the multifaceted interaction of the flavor components of true vanilla. Vanillin is a key flavor component of vanilla. In good quality vanilla, the level of vanillin is measured to make sure it is present at a high enough quantity, but a synthetic vanilla based just on vanillin will have an insipid and thin taste, even if natural vanillin is used in it's manufacture. Much like wine connoisseurs, expert flavor evaluators look for a variety of flavor characteristics--woodiness, sweetness, creaminess, smokiness, etc--in the flavor profile of a vanilla. A chart called a spidergraph is often used to show the results of a vanilla evaluation. This spidergraph represents the flavor profile of Frontier Indian vanilla. » What is Vanilla? |
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