Claire Saffitz

But you get the ease of extract, which is just like... And I keep it in a squeeze bottle.

I have to say, I tend to be pretty extravagant with my vanilla use.

And part of that is because I keep it in a squeeze bottle.

It's so easy to just add a couple little shots of it to whatever it is I'm making.

So I love it.

I think like scraping a vanilla bean, vanilla beans are, it's a little risky for a vanilla bean because they dry out so fast.

So, and this kind of segues into your question about price.

I like to buy vanilla beans in bulk, but it's risky because if they dry out, then you're kind of at a loss.

So I just feel like keeping paste is like you get a lot of the benefit of the bean because you have the seeds in there.

You get the ease of extract.

You get a flavor that's somewhere in the middle in terms of its potency.

So as far as price, I generally think you get what you pay for.

But I do think there's crazy price gouging that happens actually with vanilla.

So I would just shop around and like compare prices.

I think that there is stuff at the grocery store that's 20 bucks that's really, really expensive and you can get a better deal elsewhere.

And I would definitely consider buying in bulk because you'll get a much better deal.

And like an extract if it's stored well, like, you know, there's nothing's going to happen to it.

So

Also, I feel like my mom's favorite place to buy vanilla extract is TJ Maxx.

They have it on the shelves.