To Sara Kubiak, vanilla is more than just something that comes in a bottle on your shelf. The co-owner of Vanilla Bean Project, a production relying on direct trade and old-fashioned recipes to make vanilla better for the planet and the people, believes vanilla — an often overlooked ingredient — should be treated as an agricultural product.
“Vanilla has a season,” Sara explained. “Vanilla is the fruit of an orchid that needs to be self-pollinated and takes nine months to grow. After it’s picked, it’s a super long process to cure the vanilla; the beans must be boiled, wrapped in blankets, and cured.”
It’s just like the story of coffee and chocolate, Sara says. “Using the best beans makes the best vanilla, and supporting the people growing these products makes a difference.” Similar to how coffee makers look for beans rated highly on the scales of quality and taste, Vanilla Bean Project evaluates beans for their vanillin levels using a proprietary cold extraction process.
Vanilla Bean Project focuses on sourcing beans from Madagascar because of the growers’ strong tradition of vanilla bean curing, which consistently produces beans with “the highest vanillin levels in the world.” They work directly with growing cooperatives — mainly women-run operations — in Madagascar to ensure fair wages and lower their carbon footprint when sourcing their vanilla beans.
After evaluating the beans, it’s a simple matter of combining water, alcohol, and chopped vanilla into steel drums to make their sought-after extract.
Sara says people refer to Vanilla Bean Project’s bottled extract as their “good vanilla,” attributing this again to the high quality of their beans.
“You can smell and taste the difference… people feel like they can use less of it because of its potency,” she said. “It’s like the difference when you go to a small roaster for their coffee rather than a large coffeemaker.”
Sara is proud to be a part of Harvie because, as she puts it, “You guys are our people. We love the work you’re doing because it’s so aligned with the work we’re doing. Creating and offering good food makes good humans and makes for a better world.”
Taste the difference of “good vanilla” for yourself — add a bottle of vanilla extract or a jar of vanilla beans to your next Harvie delivery!