Christmas in July – Homemade Vanilla Extract
With just under 5 months until Christmas, it might be time to start thinking about gifts for your friends and family. That’s what I was doing about a year ago. I am definitely a big planner and had decided early in 2009 to make as many Christmas gifts as I could. Some of these gifts required quite a bit of time and some were easy to throw together. This week I’ll be sharing the gifts that I gave our family and friends last year.
The first gift came about due to a sale on Amazon. There was a great deal on 1/2 lb of vanilla beans. I started with two bottles of vodka and the vanilla beans. Once the beans were split (but not scraped) and placed in the vodka, the bottles just had to sit in a cool dark place. Every couple of weeks Hubby would pull the vodka out of the closet and shake the crap out of it. A couple months later the vanilla extract was ready to go!
I ordered some bottles online and made some labels for the bottles to finish off the look. I also placed two vanilla beans into each bottle.
I love that the vanilla extract tastes so good, has the specks of fresh vanilla beans, and will essentially never run out. If the vanilla starts running low, you can just top it off with some more vodka. As you use vanilla beans, just throw the pods in the bottle to replenish the vanilla flavor.
One Year Ago: Goat Cheese Potato Salad and Salmon with Yellow Pepper and Cilantro Pesto
Two Years Ago: Champagne Cupcakes
I am Jen the Beantown Baker. Engineer by day and baking maven by night. Hubby serves as my #1 fan and official taste tester. We got hitched back in 2006. Barefoot. In the sand. With the waves crashing behind us. It was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. 
This is a great post and I love that you and your sister made these together! You know its a favorite when you can make a recipe from memory! Thanks for participating 🙂
Awesome bars! You and your sister sound like me and my sister, so I loved this post extra for that. Great submission, thanks for participating.
Yum, these look SO good! And fairly easy – I will be making them soon!
Love the story that goes with these 🙂 family recipes are the best!
OH YUM!! Those look so freakign gooooood!!
Those look great!!!!!!!!!! MMmmmmm
I suppose if you were fond of chocolate they would be the best dang thing. I’d like the blonde version of this instead. 🙂
You almost make me wish I had a sister instead of six brothers, almost. 🙂
~ingrid
oh my neighbor makes these and they are SO good! Mmmm I’m wishing I had one right about now, thanks for sharing the recipe!
(also glad you enjoyed the taquitos!)
whoa, a whole pack of caramels? this sounds amazing
Oh.my.gosh! I bet these really are the best dang thing ever! I can’t wait to make these to bring to work!
I wonder if these can be made with a plain chocolate cake mix since I don’t have a german chocolate one on hand.
I would think any chocolate cake mix would work
These are close to the Pioneer Woman’s Knock You Naked Brownies except for the frosting. Thank goodness chocolate and caramel are legal!