If I didn't know what a vanilla pod looked like and I came upon one lying on the counter, I'd bludgeon it with my shoe.
How can one of the most wonderful flavours on Earth be housed in a casing that resembles a leathery, black eel? While the vanilla flower is exquisite, the bean that renders the most important baking essence in the world is butt ugly.
And expensive.
They start at about $3.00 a bean and go up. But despite their off-putting looks and high price-tag, nothing, NOTHING tastes like real vanilla.
So when I made vanilla ice cream, I couldn't bring myself to discard the used bean. Even though I'd steeped the pod in the cream and scraped out the pencil-dot seeds, there was plenty of life left in it.
Instead of tossing the black shell into the waste, I buried it in a jar with a cup of white sugar, screwed on a lid and gave it a shake every few days. In a couple of weeks I had fragrant, decadent vanilla sugar.
Common in Europe, vanilla sugar hasn't caught on here. I'm not sure why. It adds depth to baking and turns a simple cup of coffee into a treat. Frugal, easy and delicious -- vanilla is the culinary proof that beauty is indeed only skin deep.
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6 comments:
Wow, you're quick with those zingers! I can just see that poor vanilla bean cowering in the corner. "Mommy, Charmian called me butt-ugly."
Love vanilla sugar. Please share tips on how to keep the texture flow-y since the one time I made it it turned into a giant, rock-hard mass. Maybe something weird like an apple slice would help? (I heard that works for brown sugar.)
I will apologize to my vanilla immediately. I thought it was tougher than that:-)
As you can see by the photo, my vanilla sugar is a bit lumpy, but no more than the stuff in my sugar bowl. I keep the jar air tight and give it a good shake every few days, which keeps it from getting rock hard. I wonder if your vanilla pod is adding too much moisture and then creating the lumps as it dries out? I use a small mason / jam jar with a good seal. This might do the trick.
On the brown sugar front, an apple slice works, but affects the taste of the sugar closest to it. I keep mine moist with a clay disc designed specifically for this task. You just soak the disc in water and then insert in the brown sugar and seal tightly. Again, the secret to success is keeping the air out.
I saw this pic as a thumbnail on Facebook and thought it was a picture of a cat's tail on a pile of snow. Then I clicked through to your post and it still pretty much looks like that... :)
Re. keeping brown sugar soft, I don't have a problem with it anymore, now that they sell it in a ziploc bag. As long as you really press out the air as you're zipping it, it stays in perfect condition.
Elizabeth, this was the only shot of the vanilla where it didn't look like a wrinkled slug. I didn't want to turn readers off -- but it does look like a cat's tail in the snow.
My brown sugar doesn't come in ziplock bags, but I put it in one once I open it. I also put in a sugar disk, just to be safe. Thanks for the suggestion. Maybe I'll try that with my vanilla sugar?
Re "Common in Europe, vanilla sugar hasn't caught on here." Pastry chefs know it, as do home bakers with a bit of a continental bent. But here, it will most likely only catch on if Domino or some other brand name starts packaging it.
Re brown sugar, I have to get one of those discs. I can never seem to get all the air out of a plastic zip bag. Once hardened, it can be softened a bit by putting a slice of bread in the bag with it. I sometimes finish the softening job w/ a mortar and pestle or even with a meat pounder. Speaking of Domino, which I did above, they once made "brownulated" sugar that came in one- and/or two-pound boxes. It was a long ago, so I don't really remember whether it was refined sugar with food coloring or something else -- but it did pour like granulated.
Claire @ http://culinary-colorado.blogspot.com
Claire,
I don't find those brown sugar disks work all that well. My best success has come from double wrapping my browns sugar first in it's own bag with an elastic to hold the bag shut and then in a ziptop bag.
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