Villa Vainilla Mexican Vanilla Beans - All Natural, Whole Grade AA Vanilla Pods, for Vanilla Extract and Baking, Gift Set, Pack of 5 whole Vanilla Beans

Listen. I bought vanilla beans thinking I was just going to make some ice cream. What I didn’t realize is that I was about to become a full-blown wizard of flavor.These beans are long, dark, and wrinkly like the wise elders of the spice world. You split one open and BAM—your kitchen smells like a five-star bakery having an existential awakening.I made homemade vanilla extract, and now I feel morally superior to everyone using the store-bought stuff. My cookies don’t just taste good—they taste expensive.Also, fair warning: once you’ve scraped a real vanilla bean, you may start saying pretentious things like, “I only bake with Madagascar varietals now.”10/10. Would smuggle these into every recipe like I’m seasoning it with edible gold.

Vanilla is really interesting. When it comes off the tree it is nothing. Then someone found out if you ferment the bean or beans you have vanilla flavored bean. Who knew. It comes from Mexico and has spread around the world to places that have a climate like Mexico. But, you still have to ferment the beans to get the vanilla flavor. I like strong coffee and it tends to be bitter. I cut up about an inch of bean in little snippets to get all the flavor out of the inch of bean. Now you have strong but smooth coffee. I use a filter coffee maker and put the bean in the filter first and then add the ground coffee. I grind the coffee beans just before making the coffee. Now you know everything I know.

I'll admit, I'm not sure what "Grade AA" means, though I assumed (my bad) that it was probably better than B-grade and possibly a little better/worse than A-grade. I like the beans for my purpose which was making extract; however, they were as good as any other B-grade extract pods - not necessarily better. I purchased these because I was not able to find Mexican vanilla beans anywhere else and I like the flavor of Mexican vanilla over standard vanilla. My extract is not ready yet so I don't know how the flavor profile will develop.The pods themselves were somewhat oily, well presented, vacuum sealed inside the tube and pliable as they should be. I didn't measure them but they were fairly uniform in length, approx. 5-1/2" or thereabouts and was not disappointed in them for my purposes. I just believe the "AA" rating is a bit misleading to consumers in general since we are usually just presented with A or B grade choices and from the description I believed these pods/beans would be more in line with A-grade. I also didn't find as many seeds inside as the pictures represent and what you might normally find in an A-grade pod, hence the 4-star rating. But overall, I was happy with purchase.

Not overly hard, quite fragrant even though properly dried, just what we need

These are not worth the money, they are not grade a. They were like old dry twigs that snap with no pressure, I will not ever buy these again. There's only good thing about these is they came the next day and the smell.

So easy to use this and make own vanilla for baking. Mixed my beans with vodka and made seperate 4 oz. bottles to give as gifts for Christmas this year. It needs to sit in dark area for about 8 weeks but after 3 weeks is smelling like the vanilla purchased in store. I use real vanilla for baking and this is a nice gift for those that like to bake with real ingredients. Cost less than half the price you pay at the store for the real thing.

I agree with most of the other reviews. The beans are a bit skinny. No sign of mold. Their smell was wonderful and now they are sitting in Vodka making a large bottle of Vanilla extract.

It was exactly what they pictured online.....vanilla bean smelled incredible. I am using it to put in vodka and make my own vanilla extract to bake with. I will know more in a few months once it has had time to work.