You Can't Just Use ANY Vanilla!

So I'm back visiting my friend Karen, the kitchen wonder, and I have to tell you that vanilla has become my new best friend.  So there is this company, in Boston no less, that imports spices and they carry five, can you believe it, FIVE different vanillas.  And they really are different!  So you may be saying to yourself that of course there are all these different types of vanilla, but believe me, you don't really get it until you stuff your nose along the sticks to notice the differences. So Karen makes everything you can imagine, all from natural and organic ingredients, including the vodka in her homemade vanilla extract.  Holy sh**!  Who even knew you could make homemade vanilla extract?  She used her bottle of homemade vanilla extract in the blueberry muffins she whipped up for breakfast in 15 minutes while I was typing this blog.  I've decided I love the Madagascar vanilla the best... Then there was the most amazing granola yesterday and I was totally mesmerized watching her microplane her nutmeg.  Now I didn't even know a microplane existed?  In fact, I'd never even seen a real nutmeg!  I'd always just bought powdered nutmeg in a bottle and called it a day.

Now as I'm sitting here, she is giving me a lesson in natural vodka.  So apparently most vodka companies use synthetic and artificial flavors, but she found a guy who uses a secret natural distilling process and then uses only actual fruit to flavor his blood orange, grapefruit or red raspberry.  She explained to me that never in her life could she drink vodka because it would burn her throat, but that doesn't happen with this vodka.  This company even makes a green tea vodka!

Now a while ago I discovered pomegranate vinegar, which also is organic.  Now I made the mistake at first of just buying the only pomegranate vinegar that was on the shelf at Whole Foods.  It was terrible... But then I found the organic one that I had to order over the internet and it was, dare I say, FABULOUS!

Now the reason I feel the need to rant about this is because many of my clients make the mistake of thinking that eating natural and organic is boring, uninteresting, tasteless.  That you have to somehow wait for your taste buds to return to a more "natural" state in order to get the flavor from the food that you had been used to.  But I'm here to tell you, well actually my friend Karen is here to tell you, that eating organic and natural is actually a blissful, enticing experience.  Even the investigation period is fascinating and fun - and all with an orgasmic finish!