Food - Drink
For The Best DIY Vanilla Extract, Break Out The Sous Vide Device
By EMILY BOYETTE
Many desserts, both simple and complicated, would taste bland, flat, and incomplete without the ultra-flavorful essence of vanilla. Vanilla extract is sold in many varieties at different price points, and if you're tired of chilling out for the high-quality stuff, you may think about making it at home, which can be complicated — unless you use sous vide.
Most DIY vanilla extract recipes take a long time and yield a bottle that is less flavorful than store-bought. However, with a sous vide water bath, you can steep vanilla pods at the perfect, consistent temperature to extract their flavors; Serious Eats' recipe starts with placing 750 g of vodka and 82.5 g of vanilla bean pods into a jar.
Place the jar into a water bath that reaches just below the lid, set the temperature to 145 degrees F, cover the area with foil, and let it sit for three hours. From there, carefully remove the jar from the hot water, place it on the counter, and allow it to come to room temperature for flavorful extract that's even better than store-bought.