Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
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Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
1–10 of 72 posts
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#2Isn't most vanillin created as a byproduct of the paper industry?
Also, I hope the prices of the real stuff goes down, at least for a few months.
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#3Isn't most vanillin created as a byproduct of the paper industry? Also, I hope the prices of the real stuff goes down, at least for a few months.
I'm actually surprised by how good the wood pulp version tastes. Unless I'm buying straight up vanilla ice cream, I don't mind the wood pulp version of vanilla at all. If it's vanilla with stuff mixed into it, I won't really be able to tell the difference.
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#4It seems like a system of phone money transfer (something like M-Pesa) would be pretty helpful there.
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#5To me this means vanilla prices are being manipulated.
If the farmers themself are not demanding so much money, then who is? Someone is artificially restricting supply, or inflating prices.
Wonder how long it will go on before it crashes....
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#6Isn't most vanillin created as a byproduct of the paper industry? Also, I hope the prices of the real stuff goes down, at least for a few months.
I'm actually surprised by how good the wood pulp version tastes. Unless I'm buying straight up vanilla ice cream, I don't mind the wood pulp version of vanilla at all. If it's vanilla with stuff mixed into it, I won't really be able to tell the difference.
It's my understanding that modern "imitation" vanilla is chemically identical to the natural stuff. Even so, I buy the regular...
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#7Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm actually surprised by how good the wood pulp version tastes. Unless I'm buying straight up vanilla ice cream, I don't mind the wood pulp version of vanilla at all. If it's vanilla with stuff mixed into it, I won't really be able to tell the difference.
It's my understanding that modern "imitation" vanilla is chemically identical to the natural stuff. Even so, I buy the regular...
I read in an article that real vanilla only matters for applications that don't involve high heat, as the other flavors in a real vanilla bean get cooked out. Imitation is just as good for most purposes.
Just remembered, it was a food lab article:
https://sweets.seriouseats.com/2013/12/taste-test-is-better-...
Food lab is my go to for food related articles interesting details behind the science and process of cooking.
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#8To me this means vanilla prices are being manipulated. If the farmers themself are not demanding so much money, then who is? Someone is artificially restricting supply, or inflating prices. Wonder how long it will go on before it crashes....
it’s not being manipulated, what you’re seeing as “the farmer wasn’t willing to accept that much” is probably a little bit of hyperbole with a few anecdotes.
The more interesting bit is that farmers are not directly setting the price they will be paid. There’s clearly a huge information assymetry, so the pricing is necessarily going to be dictated by the purchasers.
Given that all of the purchasers know the same thing, they will know approximately what the actual market price will be. Before they have talked to any farmers. They don’t need to talk to any other purchasers. They have all of the required information. So when the legal market period starts all of the purchasers will arrive knowing what a reasonable price will be this season.
From a farmers point of view though, what happens is this:
* You take your beans to the market
* you are offered money for the beans. Sometimes you are offered 100 times as much. You have no idea why.
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#9It seems like a system of phone money transfer (something like M-Pesa) would be pretty helpful there.
The problem I suspect is that the local banking system isn’t super great, needing enough money to buy a smart phone in order to accept payment seems risky.
Re: Bracing for the Vanilla Boom
#10This is a super neat article.
I do wonder if some of the big asset purchases (the motorbike example) are also to act as a non-bank money store? Much easier to lock up a bike than a pile of money, etc.