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Vanilla bean != Vanillin, since the smell of natural vanilla bean has a many more components to it other than Vanillin which lend it that characteristic odor (sweet, animalic, slightly woody and herbaceous).

Vanillin by itself is of course a principle component. However, coumarin and vanillin don't smell too similar. Coumarin has more of a herbaceous, 'hay' smell, quite different from vanillin itself.



Agreed. My use of "substitute" was a bad choice. I would not have thought that coumarin could/would be used as a component in vanilla substitutes.

"They make glue out of horses. I don’t know who started that. Who saw that potential? That’s pretty amazing to me..." --- Jerry Seinfeld [1]

[1] https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/comedy/jerry-seinfeld-im-telli...


I know it’s a rhetorical question—but I’m sure that someone discovered animal glues because they were cooking, left the animal products to cook in water, and then let it dry out.

You cook it because it’s supposed to be food, but sometimes you’re left with this thick, sticky substance. Voilà, glue.


I spend an inordinate amount of time wondering how people discovered amadou, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amadou as well as glue.


manioc is the one that really makes me wonder, it needs some pretty complex and time consuming processing before it's not poisonous.


Right- reminiscent of nixtamalization.




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