Vanilla beans Nutrition facts

Vanilla beans

Vanilla beans are pleasantly fragrant fruit pods obtained from the tropical climbing orchid, V. planifolia. Mayans were the first people to use them in chocolate drinks as a flavoring agent centuries before the Spanish explorers first set their foot in Mexico in 1520. This highly prized aromatic bean pod is native to the tropical rainforests of Central America, and only recently its cultivation has spread to other tropical regions through European explorers.
Botanically, it is a perennial herbaceous climbing vine belonging to the family of Orchidaceae, in the genus, vanilla. Scientific name: Vanilla planifolia (flat-leafed vanilla).