BEAUTIFUL BOTANICALS: Vanilla’s history is a long and highly fascinating one
Vanilla is a spice derived from orchids, writes Joanne Howdle.
The orchid family is a sprawling conglomeration of 25,000 distinct species native to South and Central America and the Caribbean.
The vanilla used world-wide as a spice is primarily obtained from the pods of the flat-leaved Vanilla planifolia an evergreen vine, which grows either on the ground or on trees. When fully grown the glossy bright green leaves of the botanical are 8–25 centimetres in length, lanceolate to oval in shape with a pointed tip. The flowers 5 centimetres in diameter, are a greenish-yellow colour, and only have a slight scent.
The first people to have cultivated orchids to produce vanilla seem to have been the Totonac people, who live along the eastern coast of Mexico in the present-day state of Veracruz.
The Totonac people used vanilla as a fragrance in temples and as a good-luck charm in amulets, as well as flavouring for food and beverages. The Aztecs acquired vanilla when they conquered the Totonacs in the 15th century; the Spanish, in turn, acquired the botanical when they conquered the Aztecs. Vanilla is believed to have been introduced to Western Europe in the 1520s by Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro Altamirano (December 1485 – 2nd December 1547).
Cortés was a Spanish conquistador who led the expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire. Cortes first experienced vanilla in 1519, when he was served a beverage containing a mixture of cocoa and vanilla by Aztec Emperor Montezuma II (1466 – 1520).
In South and Central America and the Caribbean the cultivation of vanilla was a low-profile affair, as few people from outside these regions knew of it. However, after its introduction to Western Europe vanilla soon became the second most expensive spice in the world (as measured in terms of average price by unit of weight) after saffron a spice derived from the flower of Crocus sativus.
Vanilla is expensive because growing the vanilla seed pods is labour-intensive as the botanical is not autogamous, so pollination, is required to enable the plant to produce the fruit from which vanilla spice is obtained. In 1837, Belgian botanist and horticulturist Charles François Antonie Morren (3rd March 1807 – 17th December 1858) pioneered a method of artificially pollinating vanilla which was deemed financially unworkable.
However, in 1841, Edmond Albius (circa 1829 – 9th August 1880) a horticulturist from the French Island of Réunion in the Indian Ocean, who was born into slavery became an important figure in the cultivation of vanilla. At the age of 12, Albius discovered that vanilla could be hand-pollinated, and this discovery made it possible to profitably grow Vanilla planifolia away from its native habitat.
Hugh Morgan (circa 1530 – 1613), apothecary to Queen Elizabeth I (7th September 1533 – 24th March 1603) is the first person known to have used vanilla as flavour and not just as an enhancer for chocolate and coffee.
Morgan used vanilla to create chocolate-free, sweetmeats for Queen Elizabeth which soon spread across Britain. In the 18th century, the French started to use vanilla to flavour ice cream.
Thomas Jefferson (13th April 1743 – 4th July 1826), who became the 3rd President of the United States of America discovered vanilla ice cream when he lived in Paris in the 1780s. Jefferson was so thrilled with it that he copied down a recipe, now preserved in the Library of Congress.
Today vanilla is widely used in both commercial and domestic baking, aromatherapy and perfume production, as only tiny amounts of the botanical are needed to impart its signature aroma and flavour. In gin production vanilla is rarely the star ingredient, the botanical is usually only included in gin to enhance the flavour of the other ingredients.
Joanne Howdle is Interpretation and Engagement Manager at the multi-award winning Dunnet Bay Distillers Ltd.