It saddens me when I hear people describe something as “vanilla” when they mean plain, unexciting, dull. When I think of vanilla flowers, real vanilla pods drying in the sun, bourbon vanilla extract and vanilla Co2 (for perfume) I want to shout, to sing *VANILLLLLLAAAA, I once met a girl called Vanillllaaaaa, The HILLS are alive with the scent of Vanillllaaaa!
Real vanilla married to cocoa makes chocolate. **Hank told me that. “Chocolate isn’t chocolate without vanilla, it’s cocoa which is delicious but it’s not chocolate.”
http://www.vimeo.com/9444016For a great adventure costa rica take the spice tour at villa vanilla www.rainforestspices.com .
Phone Henry/Hank and he’ll send someone to pick you up at one of the nearby hotels or in town. You could also email him and make arrangements before you go to Costa Rica (recommended). The villa vanilla spice tour will teach you about growing the vanilla vines, pollinating the flowers and curing the vanilla beans.
(In this video Louis at Villa Vanilla is showing me how to pollinate a vanilla flower. If the flower isn’t pollinated there will be no pod and the flowers only last for a day before they fall off. So the farmers have to pass through the forest every day looking for new flowers. There are bees who pollinate the flowers but if they left it to the bees less than 1 percent of the flowers would be pollinated. What Louis is basically saying in the video is that you have to stick a little needle into the side of the flower, pull down a little lip/tongue inside the flower and then press the two parts together. At Villa Vanilla you’re tour guide will show you cinnamon trees and how they harvest the Ceylon Cinnamon ( Henry is very particular about it being Ceylon because he says that the cassia cinnamon is absolutely not the cinnamon to use medicinally or in any quantity because it contains a blood thinner that could be damaging in larger doses)
Hank’s biodynamic vanilla beans make for a superior vanilla lotion. If you have super dry skin, are looking for an organic lotion or a vanilla lotion made from real vanilla beans try my Skye Botanicals hand and body lotion made with villa vanilla’s biodynamic vanilla beans.
You know how oily/sticky a real vanilla bean feels (when it hasn’t been sitting around for ever getting all dried out) ? Well, that oiliness contributes directly to the hydrating and healing of your skin when incorporated into your lotion or body butter. Used as a “whole herb” vanilla leaves a trace protective film on your skin creating a breathable barrier against the harsh effects of the environment, from sun exposure to pollutants.
Last time I went to villa vanilla it wasn’t too hot and there were hardly any biting insects even in the evening…but the two times before that I would have gone crazy if it weren’t for my natural insect repellent ! I think also I had built up a tolerance to sun and weather of all kinds from my summers farming on Martha’s Vineyard (rain or shine, up anatem 6 am!). My muscles were no longer of the purely indoor kind but of a slightly more rugged out doorsy kind, ( really, true I tell you!). As an aside when I told one of my tico friends, William, that I was a farmer on Martha’s Vineyard he grabbed one of my hands and stroked it while looking at me saying “oh yeah, how come your hands are so smooth then” “suave” he said. “yo utilizar guantes, todo el tiempo!” I protested, “I wear gloves all the time!” He lifted his head back a little and looked at me as if to say ,”OK gringa, if you say so”.
Home again to our little village! One of the really nice things about living in the mountains in Costa Rica is the temperate climate which tends to be about 70 degrees year round. If we want hot hot we can go visit our musician friends down at the beach or design a completely new costa rica adventure! But when we go home and begin to make the climb into the mountains down come the car windows and off goes the air conditioner for gulps of cool “fresca” mountain air. We also like the more authentic, tourist free tico village way of life, it is far more tranquilo (please see my post tranquilo).
*I do hope at least some of you understand British humor, it is the one thing I actually like that I’ve retained from being British.
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Vanilla has a unique uplifitng feeling. However, it is great too for playful vanity. It ought to be called Vainilla like in the Spanish word for tiny pod if only to stress the VAIN.
You are so right Daniel! VAINilla, like chocolate IS the “food of the Gods”!
Villa Vanilla sounds wonderful! Besides the fact that vanilla is my favorite scent; Costa Rica is someplace I’ve been looking forward to visiting for a long time. I hear there are quite a few expatriates living there. The bugs might be a bit much though!