Tastes like a beaver's ass.
this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2026
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it tastes like this:
I just licked my screen and can definitively say that tastes very different from vanilla.
Happy.
It is msg for the sweet taste. Just try baking anything without vanilla (extract/sugar) and you will see how boring everything is.
It is spicy, warm and the bare minimum any sweet should aspire to be. Perfect foundation for other flavors to build upon.
Garlic is to cookimg as vanilla extract is to baking, In that the amount I add to my food is guided by the Reckless extravagance and utter disregard, verging on mild Contempt for the recipe As written
- baronvoncheese
It got out of fashion but many sweet recipes got their flavour from a wider range of spices, straight from the rack: nutmeg, mace, cloves, rose water, orange blossom water, orange peel powder, lemon peel powder, cummins, coriander... Even black pepper.
Current day foods are mostly bland. It requires going to a country (or at least a restaurant from there) where spices are used generously in every dish to realize this.
Well, the food itself you add all these spices to itself has a flavor. If you make everything taste like a mix of all the different spices that becomes a another kind of samey and boring even if you wouldn't use the word "bland" any more. Of course no cuisine does exactly that, but to me, some tend more to one side of that spectrum or the other. There are different ways of striking a balance. Italian is an example of a great cuisine that no one would accuse of being boring which tends toward using a light hand and fewer ingredients at time.
You're right. And you put forward a good point: the ingredients itself have flavour, which most people just cover or ignore. Too much is as bad, if not worst, than not enough.
My own national cuisine shares a few contact points with italian but I don't really agree with your point. There are many dishes where spices get very heavy handed but are usually layered and the end result is a symphony between all parts. The simplicy us, regardless, commendable. Any good dish relies on simplicity.
I just love vanilla. I don't find it boring, so usually one of my ice cream scoops is always a nilla.
I agree, that using different spices make sweets richer - and I do have my sweet spot (heh) for raisins soaked in rum. To top off your list with something with a kick :) bourbon and such other liquor works well also.
I have nothing against it. It's mild enough yet interesting enough to please nearly anyone and everyone.
It never ceases to amaze me how being "vanilla" gained the other connotation it has.
I've prepared my own extract and I can only say it vastly surpasses comercial ones. And as someone that enjoys cooking, I used it in nearly everything I could imagine, including savory sauces. It works. It should not, but it does.
Bourbon doesn't really make my fancy but I know it is a well known pairing.
It's that flavour/aroma that is nearly infallible.
It never ceases to amaze me how being “vanilla” gained the other connotation it has
it comes from ice cream parlours.
I find myself eager yet dreading my next visit to a gelaterie after knowing that.
It’s spicy
I have to disagree with you there. Of the many words I may use to describe the taste of vanilla, ‘spicy’ is certainly not among them. ‘Spicy’ is a word I associate with flavors that are sharp and picante, whereas vanilla is, as you said, warm, rich, soft, even a little bit tangy when unsweetened. Pretty much the opposite of ‘spicy’ imo.
I agree with the rest of your description, though. I find your descriptor, “The MSG for the sweet taste,” pretty spot on.
White people spicy
Hehehe…
Vanilla tastes exactly how it smells: sweet, pungent, with a slightly bitter aftertaste. Sugar takes care of that.
I would describe it as very rich. Also fruit adjacent, not quite fruity but sort of like that flavour.
Absolutely! It's the purest fruitiest fruit taste in the world, to me.that's why everyone loves it. People who don't be big fruit enthusiasts can't quite put their finger on that
Tastes like CHEMICALS :o
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taste
but also vanilla seeds (like other orchids) only germinate in the presence of certain fungi
"mmm this smoothie tastes like 4-Hydroxy-3-methoxybenzaldehyde." - Things said by the utterly deranged
Chicken
ethanol-soaked oak /j
Beaver anus.
See, what I really want to know about castoreum is, who's the person that went around rimming wildlife until they found an animal whose butthole tasted good? And was this part of their job, somehow, or just a... personal hobby? So many questions, none of them answered by the Wikipedia article.
Most likely it was discovered during the butchering of beavers.
Beaver pelt was a highly valued product on the American frontier for hundreds of years. A whole trade was built around it. And given the circumstances of the first ~200 years of Europeans colonising Northern America, they wouldn't have wasted the rest of the animal just for the pelt - what little meat every beaver had would've been used.
So you're out there, butchering a beaver, grabbing it by the pu... anus, and you notice that even though you washed the carcass, there's some oily residue on your gloves/hand after pressing around the area. It's not something you've seen before, but you know very well how valuable all sorts of animal oils (tallow, pig fat, especially whale blubber) are, so you check it out. First thing you do is smell it... and damn, it smells GOOD. Maybe you've even had a bit of vanilla before as a treat, and recognise the scent being similar. Then you taste it, just a lick... and it's just like that piece of cake you had at the fancy cake shop ages ago as a kid. Or not recognise it but realise it's tasting good.
Either way, you just found a potentially usable resource. Spices and seasonings are still a luxury, so you tell others about it, after all, who wouldn't want to make some extra money on the work they're already doing?
And suddenly people want it. Vanilla is scarce and expensive, people like the flavour, and beavers are plentiful. You extract some oil, take it to the town chemist who checks it, deems it safe to use, and BAM, you have a new revenue stream, all you have to do is 30 minutes of extra work on the beavers you caught - wash the ass, express the anal glands for their oils, collect it up, and sell it by vials.
Most discoveries happen like that. Yes, to us it sounds weird, who the hell goes around licking asses of animals for hidden secrets? But in reality you were just making use of something, and found an extra resource.
People used to eat anything and everything out of desperation. They weren't out to taste anuses specifically. Well, most people weren't. They get to the last part, are still hungry, grimace and put it in their mouth and there's an unexpectedly pleasant (given the circumstances) surprise.
We also have dogs. After enough time with enough people and enough dogs, eventually someone's going to notice their dog being especially excited about eating the part that they'd normally give to it to eat, and so sniff, if not actually taste. Same surprised reaction.
There's also the fact that no person (or dog) must have died from doing this, so other people were less afraid to try it.
Well, most people weren't
Animal Anuses Georg is an outlier and should not be counted
I've heard it tastes very similar to breast milk, which was the source of nourishment and life for almost everyone as a baby. This unknowing association with something so vital for survival is supposedly why it's such a popular flavor.
I never noticed but yeah, I can see it. Not 100% since it's been ages since I was around vanilla, but distantly I can see it.
Comment mitosis but from different accounts.... how? Unless one of you just copied the other's comment for some reason
There’s a subtle hilarious difference between the two
Omfg lmaooo, I just noticed
I never noticed but yeah, I can see it. Not 100% since it's been ages since I was around breast milk, but distantly I can see it.
Tastes are hard to describe. Best to just get a small bottle of vanilla extract from your local supermarket and put a drop on your tongue.
I wouldn't recommend doing this. Vanilla extract is quite strong on its own. I believe an indirect approach to be the best. A few drops into something edible that has a weak or neutral taste. Even a glass of water, maybe some white bread, etc.
Some vanilla extract are also not vanilla but made from cloves. Weird but true. Don't know how they do the chemistry. It was put out in the open by a famous chef a few years back.
What I can vouch for, personally, is making your own vanilla extract at home, using alcohol. Don't recommend vodka but I recognize it is a widely available and usually affordable alcohol; tried it and the end result was disappointing.
To tie into your comment, I'd also consider cream crackers. Eat a couple first to establish a base line for your palate, then put a drop of extract on another and chew slowly
It's the default taste