The Totonac used vanilla as a fragrance in temples and as a good-luck charm in amulets, as well as flavoring for food and beverages. The Totonac people, who live along the eastern coast of Mexico in the present-day state of Veracruz, were among the first people to domesticate vanilla, cultivated on farms since at least 1185. Vanilla planifolia traditionally grew wild around the Gulf of Mexico from Tampico around to the northeast tip of South America, and from Colima to Ecuador on the Pacific side, as well as throughout the Caribbean. 1580) and description of its use and properties written in the Nahuatl language Nevertheless, vanilla is widely used in both commercial and domestic baking, perfume production, and aromatherapy.ĭrawing of the Vanilla plant from the Florentine Codex (c. Vanilla is the second-most expensive spice after saffron because growing the vanilla seed pods is labor-intensive. Madagascar's and Indonesia's cultivations produce two-thirds of the world's supply of vanilla. planifolia species, more commonly known as Bourbon vanilla (after the former name of Réunion, Île Bourbon) or Madagascar vanilla, which is produced in Madagascar and neighboring islands in the southwestern Indian Ocean, and in Indonesia.
![vanilla perfume vanilla perfume](https://fimgs.net/mdimg/secundar/o.63745.jpg)
The majority of the world's vanilla is the V. pompona, found in the West Indies, Central America, and South America. tahitensis, grown in the South Pacific and V. fragrans), grown on Madagascar, Réunion, and other tropical areas along the Indian Ocean V. Three major species of vanilla currently are grown globally, all of which derive from a species originally found in Mesoamerica, including parts of modern-day Mexico. By the end of the 20th century, Albius was considered the true discoverer. Noted French botanist and plant collector Jean Michel Claude Richard falsely claimed to have discovered the technique three or four years earlier. Hand-pollination allowed global cultivation of the plant. In 1841, Edmond Albius, a 12-year-old slave child who lived on the French island of Réunion in the Indian Ocean, discovered that the plant could be hand-pollinated. The method proved financially unworkable and was not deployed commercially. In 1837, Belgian botanist Charles François Antoine Morren discovered this fact and pioneered a method of artificially pollinating the plant.
![vanilla perfume vanilla perfume](https://www.ventvenir.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/5f20c42f-92c3-48f5-b92a-68307d72cae9.jpg)
Pollination is required to make the plants produce the fruit from which the vanilla spice is obtained. Vanilla is a spice derived from orchids of the genus Vanilla, primarily obtained from pods of the Mexican species, flat-leaved vanilla ( V. planifolia).