Slash Your Baking Budget
Posted by Arwen Mosher in Food on Monday, April 20, 2009 8:41 PM
I love to celebrate by baking. The taste of a fresh cookie, still warm from the oven, makes it very easy for me to be joyful!
During seasons of feasting like Easter, I find myself reaching often for my bottle of vanilla extract. Every time I open it and inhale its sweet, exotic scent, I think about how much I love the stuff.
I also think about how I’m glad I don’t have to buy bottles of it at full price.
Pure vanilla extract is expensive. My favorite spice supplier, Penzey’s, sells extract for $32 for a 16 fl. oz. (1 pint) bottle. I did a little comparison shopping and found that is pretty much the going rate. That means every tablespoon of extract costs a dollar! And that’s assuming you spring for the big bottle - buying smaller quantities at a time makes the unit cost go up.
When I mentioned making my own vanilla extract on my blog several years ago, I found that a lot of people didn’t know it was possible! My parents have always made their own vanilla, and I do it just like they do, a half-gallon bottle at a time.
It’s incredibly easy. I spend $29 for 15 vanilla beans (which I buy here) and $12 for a half-gallon of the cheapest vodka I can find. I cut the beans in 1-inch pieces, put them in the bottle, shake it up and let it sit in a dark place for a couple months. Then I transfer some of it to a smaller bottle for kitchen use and continue to let the extract in the large bottle get stronger with time.
It makes great vanilla extract, and only costs about 32 cents per tablespoon! That’s 1/3 the cost of bottled extract. And as my homemade extract in the big bottle continues to get more potent, I can use less in a recipe, which makes the unit cost continue to decrease.
If you don’t want to make an entire of half-gallon of extract at a time, you could scale the quantities down. If you want a method that doesn’t take two months, I don’t have any personally but this article looks promising.
Don’t you want to smile every time you use vanilla extract, knowing you’re getting it at a bargain? Try making your own!
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