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Vanilla Infusion

A vanilla infusion made by steeping beans in alcohol and water, then boiling water and combining the two infusions.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and beans match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,293 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Vanilla Infusion

Ingredients

Directions

Steep the vanilla

  1. Cut vanilla beans into small sticks.

  2. Place them in a large glass beaker.

  3. Pour in 1 quart of alcohol and 1 quart of water.

  4. Cover and steep for 8 days.

Make the second infusion

  1. Strain through a fine sieve to obtain the first infusion.

  2. Put the vanilla back into a porcelain vessel.

  3. Pour boiling water over the vanilla and let it cool.

  4. Strain again through a fine sieve.

Combine and store

  1. Mix the two infusions and store in bottles.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Vanilla + beanstop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Vanilla beans
Supply the aromatic compounds that flavour the infusion.
Alcohol
Dissolves and extracts vanilla flavour compounds during steeping, and helps preserve the liquid.
Water
Extracts water-soluble flavour from the vanilla and dilutes the alcohol.

The step that matters

Cover and steep for 8 days. Flavour compounds leave the vanilla slowly, and alcohol extracts them over time. Cutting the steeping short gives a weak, under-flavoured infusion.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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