Madagascar vanilla planifolia comparison

L to R: Amadeus Super Long & Regular, Vanilla Products USA, Beanilla (click for larger image)

Click here for the full Madagascar Planifolia vanilla bean comparison gallery.

Nearly every vendor has a Madagascar origin vanilla bean. A comparison demonstrates the extent to which vanilla grown in the same country can carry. Why are they so different? I imagine ripening, curing, and handling all play a role. Your thoughts?

Grade A gourmet beans should be moist and oily, with the approximate color and shine of a raisin. The pictures are a bit shiny, but you can notice the darker color of the Grade ‘A’ bean and the softer flesh (as can be seen in the bisection pictures). The Amadeus Super-Long Madagascar and Beanilla.com Madagascar are also very ‘plump’ or ‘fat’ beans, while the Vanilla Products USA beans were a bit thin and flat.

Beanilla Madagascar Planifolia (click for larger image)

It’s fairly easy to spot lower-quality (extract) beans. Grade B extract beans should be drier and less attractive. The major indicators are an overly-dry skin that doesn’t flex well. If you bend a so-called “gourmet” bean and it breaks, this is a bad sign. The broken bean pictured below is a good example of this. It has plenty of caviar and flavor, but doesn’t meet my standards of Grade A beans. Fine for making extract, though.

Bad Amadeus “Regular” Vanilla Bean (click for larger image)

The broken bean is a Grade A Regular-Sized Madagascar bean from Amadeus Trading. I am convinced this is an isolated incident. Glenn at Amadeus provided fantastic service and replaced these beans with some very nice “Super-Long Madagascar” beans. This is further confirmed by instructables member cdrivanova’s Flickr photo set that shows some nice regular-sized Madagascar beans from Amadeus. Except for a couple regular-sized Madagascars, the beans from Amadeus were all very nice. I’m convinced that a few dried old beans went out from the bottom of the box during the busy Christmas season.

Vanilla Products USA (L) Amadeus “Regular” (R) (click for larger image)

Click here for the full Madagascar Planifolia vanilla bean comparison gallery.