Hello, Love: Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla Paste

I fell in love the other day, deeply and truly. So much so that it would be wrong of me to keep my new love to myself; I need to share with you. If you're a baker – or a vanilla-lover – Nielsen-Massey's Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Bean Paste will change your life. I'm always on the hunt for increasingly potent vanilla options, trying various strength liquid vanilla extracts for extra kick. Or actual vanilla beans, which after a while become prohibitively expensive. So when I tried Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Bean Paste at a HipCooks cooking class, I was in heaven. I wasn't the only one in the class that became slightly obsessed with the magical paste, so I admittedly kept one eye on my dish and another on the wall, making sure the enchanted bottles of vanilla paste didn't disappear. Lucky for me, they didn't. But it didn't stop me from making a mad dash after class to get my hands on one.

Why is it so amazing? Nielsen-Massey's formula is made from pure vanilla with natural vanilla beans that has been worked into a paste. It's perfect in any baked recipe and even adds a wonderfully genuine taste of vanilla to breakfast dishes (I put a teaspoon in my waffle batter just the other morning). And at $8/bottle, it's great to know that a tiny bit goes a long way. So instead of doubling (or even tripling) doses of watered-down vanilla extract, try this Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla Bean Paste. You'll get that vanilla kick you've been looking for.