What Is the Difference Between Vanillin and Vanilla?

The vanilla plant was originally from South America and was discovered by the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortes. He witnessed the Aztec Emperor drinking a chocolate beverage flavored with the seeds of the vanilla plant. Then it was brought back to Europe where people fell in love with it. Vanilla is the spice from the pod of orchids from the vanilla plant. So, what is vanillin or the ingredient that we commonly see on the back of our ice cream? Vanillin is actually the molecule that gives vanilla its distinct smell and taste. Vanillin is only one of 200-250 other chemicals inside of vanilla extracted from the plant.

Naturally extracting vanilla flavor is very hard, because the plant is only grown in select regions around the equator where the environment is ideal, or in some greenhouses. It is primarily produced in Madagascar, Indonesia, and Comoros. The pollination of the plant is very labor-intensive and requires a lot of time as it can only be done by hand. It also takes some time for the plant to become ripe. But the demand for products flavored with vanilla is very high and only increasing.

So How Do We Have Vanilla Flavored Food?

In actuality, only 1% of vanilla flavoring we use comes from the vanilla plant. The vanillin chemical is extracted through multiple different methods allowing all of us to enjoy readily available vanilla flavored products. Originally, two German chemists, Ferdinand Tiemann and Wilhelm Haarmann discovered a way to make vanillin by synthesizing tree sap. Currently the cheapest and most effective way to make vanillin is using guaiacol that is created from petrochemicals. This method produces about 85% of the synthesized vanillin used in everything you love. The price of naturally extracted vanillin is approximately 300 times more expensive than synthetic vanillin. That is why natural vanillin is only used in special things that require it.

Vanillin also has a cousin called Ethyl vanillin which is similar with just some small molecular differences.Flavor Ethyl vanillin is 3-5 stronger than regular vanillin but is relatively expensive. It can be used in conjunction with regular vanillin to mimic the natural flavor and aroma vanilla.

Vanillin and the Pharmaceutical Industry

We all have our favorite vanilla flavored products like chocolates, milkshakes, pastries and multiple other baked goods. My favorite is ice-cream! But vanillin is used in so much more than just foods. It is also an important part of perfumes and drugs. Believe it or not, 5% of vanillin is used to make drugs. It is used as an intermediate to manufacture several very important drugs like Aldomet (used to treat symptoms of high blood pressure and kidney problems), and L-DOPA (a precursor to important molecules like adrenaline).