I am serious about baking

I take my baking very seriously.  When I first made cookies for my  honey he looked at the mason jar of vanilla extract on my kitchen table and said what the heck is that?  Homemade vanilla extract.  I told him that I made my own, I guess maybe he didn't quite believe me at the time though?

I use it in everything I bake and especially the marshmallows I make.  This ain't no bottled imitation garbage.  This is straight up vanilla beans and vodka and the more beans I can cram into each jar the better.  I've got a few jars that I top off when I see them getting low, pour from one jar into the next and start all over when I've got just a few drops left in the jar I use most often.  The oldest batch I have is about 4 years old and so dark and rich.

When I'm baking or making any kind of sweets I always add a little more vanilla than the recipe calls for.  I always give the jar a good shake and make sure I get plenty of those teeny black vanilla beans into whatever I'm baking.

My dad was a huge fan of Breyers vanilla ice cream, it had to be Breyers with the crisp white ice cream little flecks of vanilla bean in there.. not that fake yellow "French" vanilla stuff.

Am I purist? Maybe a little.  When I'm baking for someone I want to make it the best it can possibly be, whether I'm baking for my family, friends or surprising someone with some treats... hell, even if I'm trying out a batch of cookies and share them with my co workers you bet it's gonna be the best batch of cookies I can make them to be.

It's all about quality and the love that goes into making them.

My honey snapped this the other night of one of my younger jars that was sitting on the kitchen table after I used a bit in some chocolate chip cookies I made to bring to dinner with friends :)