The humble vanilla bean. I love it dammit.

[Hambone]

I love a vanilla bean in my apple pie and my peach macerations. I will be experimenting with putting them in whiskeys after finding this thread...

[Kindafrench]

I put a tonka bean into my 30 liter barrel of UJSM and let it macerate for 12 month. Well, Bourbon with a twist it became. Everybody loves it.

[TDick]

Thanks for giving this a bump!
I'm doing an experiment :Nuclear Rum-Mad Science
cheap commercial rum soaking on cherry wood chips - 10 days now.

This looks like a really good addition but I'm wondering if I should continue to age on chips alone for the rest of the month,
or add a vanilla bean now.

With all the posts about getting some of the best prices on Ebay, I did some checking.
For just wanting a little bit, these seem to be two good choices BUT I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT EITHER OF THEM!

This is Three Beans for $4.00.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/274709797865?h ... SwpqFgQ5qP

This one is Five Beans for $5.00. They are advertised as 7 inches long but ARE ALREADY SPLIT.
https://ebay.us/hGv2VL
The description includes,
"From the internet: "Whole" refers to beans that are intact. "Split" means that the bean has split - either on the vine or during the curing process.
Splits are sometimes preferred by commercial producers of vanilla extract because they usually have a higher vanillin content.
Best used for extract making.
Packages Shipped on Same or next Business day. (California)"

For MY purposes it seems like 3-5 beans is the right number to experiment with.

[Kindafrench]

I would suggest organic ones if possible.

[humphries439]

Anyone use pure Vanilla extract?

[Hillbilly Popstar]

Anyone use pure Vanilla extract?

Plenty of people here make their own

[Bushman]

Used to be you could buy Vanilla beans around Christmas at Costco, they came in a tube and was about twice the length as in the grocery store. The prices were less than half but they only carried them around Christmas. I loaded up at that time but haven’t seen them on the shelf for a couple years. As for vanilla extract I have not used it as a substitute.