One island the size of France.
One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
21–30 of 179 posts
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#22There are tons of plants that have the same flavor profile as vanilla, just not ones that retain their flavor when dried for years on end. But if you're just making ice cream, you could just as easily use black locust flowers or whatever and no one would know the difference.
Sure, most natural flavorings have artificial substitutes, but there is a market for the natural products even if nobody could really distinguish them by taste alone.
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#23> it's one of the few regions with the right climate that is also poor enough to make laborious hand-pollination affordable
It's not like I didn't know that this is how the world works, but this specific case is even more of a slap in the face. It's kinda fucked up to think that in the local specialty store merely a couple pods of vanilla (a few grams each) go for 6-7 dollars, but these folks live in poverty. But more fucked up is the implication that to keep vanilla prices down we specifically maintain these conditions, because of cheap labor.
Oh well, the artificial stuff for me from now on.
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#24There are tons of plants that have the same flavor profile as vanilla, just not ones that retain their flavor when dried for years on end. But if you're just making ice cream, you could just as easily use black locust flowers or whatever and no one would know the difference.
Sure, most natural flavorings have artificial substitutes, but there is a market for the natural products even if nobody could really distinguish them by taste alone.
black lotus flowers would be a natural substitute.
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#25There are tons of plants that have the same flavor profile as vanilla, just not ones that retain their flavor when dried for years on end. But if you're just making ice cream, you could just as easily use black locust flowers or whatever and no one would know the difference.
Sure, most natural flavorings have artificial substitutes, but there is a market for the natural products even if nobody could really distinguish them by taste alone.
This comment reads a bit like a non-sequitur, given Alex was talking about natural substitutes for vanilla, and not artificial ones.
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#26There are tons of plants that have the same flavor profile as vanilla, just not ones that retain their flavor when dried for years on end. But if you're just making ice cream, you could just as easily use black locust flowers or whatever and no one would know the difference.
Sure, most natural flavorings have artificial substitutes, but there is a market for the natural products even if nobody could really distinguish them by taste alone.
The substitute was not artificial. It's a natural alternative.
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#27Is that really a problem if you can supply the world's needs with 5 plants? One of the older "life hacks" is to put a teaspoon of vanilla extract in the oven to make the house smell better. Speaking from experience: don't use more than that or you will regret it. I couldn't visit their house for a week.
Which 5 plants are you referring to?
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, let's import an alien species in a closed ecosystem. What could go wrong?
Granted, I guess I should have asked in the past tense? Why didn’t they? And why don’t local bees work in pollinating the vanilla vines?
It’s suprisigly complicated. The first link seems not to have had success (but it’s a surprisingly interesting read) and the second suggests that a specific, nearly extinct bee is needed.
http://www.aos.org/orchids/additional-resources/pollinating-...
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#29I wonder why they can’t import the necessary bees and eliminate most of the manual labor from the process?
An interesting challenge: build a small tree/pole-climbing robot that would methodically pollinate all flowers (manipulators, image recognition).
See my reply to a comment with the same great grand parent. It’s suprisingly complicated and seems tricky for even skilled humans.
Re: One Island Grows 80% of the World’s Vanilla
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, let's import an alien species in a closed ecosystem. What could go wrong?
Granted, I guess I should have asked in the past tense? Why didn’t they? And why don’t local bees work in pollinating the vanilla vines?
It is quite surprising this hasn’t happened yet, what with all the other bad ecological decisions that get made in the furtherance of industrial farming. Not that I don’t like vanilla or food or anything. I’m just surprised, it seems kind of an obvious business move. Maybe the bees wouldn’t survive?