I occasionally get questions from people who are growing their own vanilla and want to know the best way to cure the beans. Getting a good cure out of your beans can be a little challenging, but hopefully, this guide will make it easier.
This guide is specific to the curing method we use here on Kauai. It is adapted from the “bourbon” method used in equatorial areas. Kauai is too cool and cloudy during the curing season to rely on the sun for heating the beans, so we use electricity to maintain curing temperatures.
It is essential that vanilla be properly cured in order to obtain the desired aroma and flavor from your vanilla beans. Processing vanilla beans is a matter of supporting both the vanillin development and the slow drying of the bean in order to preserve it.
The instructions here are for vanilla planifolia beans. There are 3 types of vanilla beans: Bourbon (vanilla planifolia), Tahitian (vanilla tahitensis), and Pompona (vanilla pompona). Each type has a somewhat different curing process, although the vanillin chemistry is generally the same. Planifolia is the one most widely used for vanilla production.
Equipment You’ll Need
In order to cure your vanilla, there are a few essential pieces of equipment you’ll need.
- Big pot for killing/thawing the beans
- Freezer (if you’re freezing them)
- Food Dehydrator
- 48 qt. Cooler
- 2 Gallon Jugs
- Kitchen Towel
- Thermometer (spike or infrared thermometer for food applications)
- 1 Gallon Plastic Zipper Bags
The food dehydrator is the most substantial item here, the widely-available Excalibur is a good choice. It’s best to have one that uses a fan to circulate the air and has a temperature control.
The cooler should be one that is well-insulated with thick walls and lid. Thin, inexpensive plastic or styrofoam coolers can be used, but it’s harder to maintain the internal temperature with those. The cooler needs to be big enough for the two gallon jugs, leaving room for your curing vanilla. The common 48 qt. size works well.
The freezer is to store your ripe beans until they can be cured. If you’re blessed with a large harvest (8 ounces/25 beans or more), you can skip the freezing part, and you’ll get better results. The thermometer is needed to to monitor the temperature, and zipper bags are what you use to hold the curing beans.
Start With Ripe Vanilla Beans
One of the most important ingredients for a successful cure is to start with ripe beans. A ripe vanilla bean will be yellowing at the tip and showing the early signs of splitting, or it’s beginning to split. The photo at the top of this article shows what ripe beans look like. The yellowing should ideally be pretty dark yellow/orange, not just pale green.
The ripening is important because the vanilla flavor is derived from the sugars that develop as the bean ripens. You want maximum sugar development for two reasons: strongest flavor and the sugars act to preserve the bean once it’s cured.
Beginning the Curing Process
Ripe vanilla beans, once picked, should be cured right away. You should begin curing the beans within 24 hours of picking.
The first step is called “killing” and what it does is stop the ripening process and open the cell walls to release the enzymes and vanillin precursors. There are several ways to kill your beans, but for most hobbyist growers, freezing is very practical.
Freezing the beans works well if you’ve got a small number of vanilla plants. The beans on your plants are not going to ripen at the same time, you’ll be harvesting a few each couple of days. As each bean ripens, put them into a freezer bag in your freezer until all your beans have ripened.
By doing it this way, your many small harvests will be combined into a single batch the be cured. This will make the curing process a lot easier to manage, and get you closer to the optimal curing batch size, which is about 1 pound of green beans.
If your harvest is 8 ounces or more (about 25 beans), you can and should cure your beans immediately, skipping the freezing part.
Setting Up The Sweat
Then next stage of the curing process is called the “sweat.” This is because the beans seem to sweat out moisture, which is necessary to get the chemical reactions going.
In very simple terms, the process we are fostering here is the enzymatic breakdown of the gluco-vanillins that are present in the ripe pod into two components: vanillin and glucose. Vanillin is the flavor and aroma of vanilla and glucose is an essential natural preservative to prevent the bean rotting or molding.
When you’ve harvested all your ripened beans and they have been in the freezer for at least 24 hours, you’re ready to begin sweating.
Prepare your sweat box (the cooler) by filling the jugs with hot tap water. This will typically be about 120℉. Place them in the cooler with space between them for the vanilla. Put a rolled-up towel (one you don’t mind getting wet and possibly stained) into the gap. The sweating vanilla will go on top of the towel, which prevents it from sitting in any moisture that might collect on the bottom of the cooler.
“Killing” the Beans
To prepare the beans for curing, they must be treated to prevent them from ripening further during curing. This also fulfills the critical function of initializing the enzymatic process that develops the vanillin in the bean. Traditionally, “killing” is done in the sun or in hot water. Freezing accomplishes the same goal, while holding the beans until you are ready to take them to the next step.
For beans that were frozen, we only need to thaw and warm them.
We used to do this in the food dehydrator, but I’ve found the results are better using a hot water bath. Get a large pot of water hot, not boiling, should be about 130–150℉. Put your frozen beans into the big pot of hot water for a minute or two, just enough to get the beans warm. You want to use a big pot for this, as the frozen beans will cool the water. If there is more water, this will be less of an issue.
For fresh/not frozen beans, we keep them in the hot water bath for 2 1/2 to 3 minutes depending on the size of the bean.
Place the thawed/killed beans into a freezer bag. If you do have more than about one pound of beans, split it into two bags. Label the bag with the date, and place in the sweat box, on the towel between the hot water jugs. Keep the lid closed.
In the next part, we get into how to complete the sweating process and how to dry and age the beans…
[…] Part 1, I explained how to harvest and prepare the beans for curing, and what equipment you’ll […]
Thank you for your great post..I want know something..when we sun dry vanilla we use a blanket and rolle it with beens and put in to the sweat box..When we dehighdrate beens shouldnt we rolled with that types of cloth
Hi Imalka,
The method you describe is different from the method we use, so I don’t have the experience give you a good answer to your question.
We don’t use the sun, it’s not hot enough here in Hawaii in the late winter/early spring when we are harvesting and curing our beans. Instead of blankets, we use plastic bags to keep the beans moist for a longer period of time, and the sweat box is electrically heated.
Good luck with curing your harvest!
Hi
Do you give tours, or can we see your farms? I’m a vanilla fanatic, and it sounds incredible what you. Would love to see your work.
Thanks!!
Dave and Wendy Pruett
Yes, we do indeed give tours. Take a look at the Vanillery Tours page for details.
Hi ,
I am from Bangalore, India and we got our first lot of vanilla pods last year in March. A small lot of 15 beans !! We have harvested it (2020) and now kept for drying.
The beans are not fully dried , but maybe a few days away. The room will be full of vanilla smell when we return in the evening.
My question is: For home use, do I need to dry the beans completely or can I use them when they are still not fully wrinkled and bit leathery to touch.
Hi Ranjit,
In most cases, if it’s not fully wrinkled, it’s not ready yet. When I am checking the beans for dryness, the outside appearance is a clue, but the real test is squeezing the bean a little to feel what’s going on inside. A finished bean will still be soft, but it should not feel “slippery” inside, as though the insides were still liquid. It will feel a bit firm, like a dried fruit.
Getting this right is a matter of experience, so do your best and pay attention to the results.
If you’re making extract, better to let the bean get drier.
Another important thing to look for is the skin of the bean should be shiny, almost oily in appearance. If it is dry and dull in appearance, there is a good chance it will mold. The shininess comes from proper curing of a ripe bean.
If you store a bean that is not dry enough, it may spoil and get off-flavors.
Thank you Roland.
I was also experimenting with ripening the beans on the plant itself (till they take a light brown color) and then keep them for drying. I observed, that the beans split if you keep it on plant for ripening.
As we are doing it for hobby in small quantity (2/3 plants, 15–30 beans at max), monitoring is not an issue.
Do you have any recommendations? Which is better: natural ripening or artificial?
Regards,
Natural ripening will not develop as much flavor as doing a proper cure. First, the conditions in the sweat box are ideal for the development of the vanillin, also the splitting of the bean is prevented, which keeps the vanillin contained within the bean.
I have also experimented with natural curing out of curiosity, and I have gotten usable vanilla out of it, but it was not very strong in flavor, and the bean was not well preserved.
Hi Roland,
What do you do with 1/2 cracked beans found on vine?
Just cure them along with all the others, they’ll dry out a bit faster, but are fine to use for extract once cured.
Hello sir,
‘we need you help to cure vanilla, so that we can get best quality
[…] article is an addition to the 2‑part How to Cure Vanilla Beans […]
Thanks for the Information..
Do you have markets to recommend to us so we can sell our Vanilla Beans using your curing methods.
Hi Ambrose,
This is very difficult advice to give, because each locality is going to have its own ways of buying and selling locally grown vanilla. If you don’t have access to a buyer in your area, it is possible to sell beans directly to some online retailers. For example Jones & Co. sells vanilla from small farmers, so they may be interested in sourcing your beans. You will need to be prepared to ship your beans internationally.
Good luck!
Thank You for your response.. We are a Papua New Guinea Vanilla Beans exporter to Hong Kong and Indonesia since 2002..(but in small quantities, as required by these markets). We came to you to assist if possible to identify buyers who are able to move larger quantities (1,0000kg) per month..) You have contact details for Jones & Sons… Thank you..
Ambrose Guarakai
Bogia Spice Exporters
Papua New Guinea
I don’t have those contacts, I’m sorry, I’m just a small farmer, I mostly sell locally and on our website. I suggest you contact online retailers directly throught their website.
Oops. I put brown but wet beans (from Mexico) into alcohol to make extract. Now they are sitting in alcohol shredded. Do I fish them out and let them dry and return them to the alchol. Wish I had visited your website beforehand!
Hi Emily,
Yes, probably the best thing to do is take those beans back out of the alcohol and dry them slowly. If they smell good, go ahead with the extraction process after that. How did you get those beans in the first place?
Thank you Roland! My Mexican friend brought them for me. I have never seen anything but the withered dry beans until these. The thing is I shredded (not chopped) the beans when I put them in the overproof alcohol. I will strain out everything and leave them to dry in the Texas sun. I won’t rinse them though. Correct?
Appreciate your help!
E
Can you dry beans in a sunny window?
The beans look Good not molding like the ones I sun dried.
You can get away with this if the beans were properly sweated. The “sweat” protects the beans from mold. If the beans don’t come out of the sweat box with a nice sheen to them, they are likely to mold…depends on the humidity where you are, but generally, it’s much safer to use a food dehydrator on low temp with circulating air to help prevent mold.
Hello Roland,
I wanted to ask your opinion on the ripeness of my beans. They flowered in 2020 in march/april/may and still haven’t turned to the yellow everyone mentions as a sign they are ready.
I was hoping I could post a pic or two for you too look at to get your opinion.
I’m in Waialua (on Oahu) so while likely dryer than your location the climate is similar.
Thanks
Dominick
It’s not quite time yet…expect to see ripening soon, however. My beans are still green also.
Hi Roland,
This is first year that we have processed beans (small nos). However, the dried beans do not smell of vanilla and when I boil the seeds in water, I am not getting any vanilla smell. Am I missing something.
Regards
Wow, I’m sorry to hear that. Vanilla doesn’t smell like vanilla unless it’s properly cured…as you probably know. The steps I describe in these articles will help you on curing your next harvest. The most important points:
1. Harvest only ripe beans, very important
2. Keep them in the freezer until you have a large enough quantity (about 1 lb/0.5Kg) to sweat them or you have harvested all your beans
3. Sweat them for 18 days in a moist, warm environment, drying them for a little bit every day.
4. Slowly dry them after the sweat until they are firm but still pliable
5. Age them for several months before using
Hello, Thank you so much for your assistance. Do fertilize during the flowering process to bring on more flowers? What process to help this?Wonderful information. I am doing the process where as soon as the tip have a yellow appearance I pick them. I place them in 160 degree water for 2minutes then wrap in a woolen cloth for 2 days. I then sun for two hours and wrap in plastic over night then sun again each day. My problem is they are shiny but some dry to wood. Then I don’t know what to do with them. I wish I could find a visual of when to stop the drying process. How do you measure the. Moisture content please? Also what do you store them in and how do you heat the box. It is confusing no site actually shows you the boxes wraps,wax paper plastic vacuum seals so a lot can be misinterpreted. Please help me. Forever grateful.
Hi Janine and thank you for your questions, I’m happy to help people get a better cure with their vanilla beans.
Our process differs significantly from the process used by other vanilla producers, partly because we don’t have sunny days and a lot of heat during our curing season here in Hawaii, which is January — March.
First, we wrap the beans in plastic bags for the sweat, we want to retain as much of the moisture as possible. We don’t use wool cloth, we think it dries them out too quickly. During the sweat process, we dry the beans a little bit each day. We use an electric food dehydrator, but you can do it in the sun if that works in your location. The idea is that the beans dry out very, very slowly during the sweat by keeping them in plastic bags all the time, except for the brief daily drying.
The sweat is done in an insulated box and kept at about 115℉ with a heating element, but that can be done with hot water bottles too.
When the sweat is complete after 18 days, then we begin to dry the beans, which we do in an open-air drying rack protected from sun and rain. Once the beans go on the rack, we check them every few days and remove the beans that have dried enough. At that point, they will be supple, easily bent, but won’t feel “slippery” inside. Hard to describe with words, you have to use your experience for this.
Once the beans have dried enough, we put them into plastic bags for aging, a minimum of 3 months. After that they are ready to be used. A properly cured bean will be soft, shiny and a bit oily to the touch. If it is like that, it won’t mold. We have very little issue with mold here, it happens rarely and only on overripe beans.
It is hard to find detailed information about curing vanilla, and most of it only applies to large-scale operations. We worked most of it out over the years with experimentation and the very good information contained in The Vanilla Handbook by Piero Banchessi.
Hello Roland,
Before keeping in plastic bag for sweat process, do you do a heat/cold treatment of beans? We are still not able to get it right. The beans dry out shiny and soft, but no flavor.
Regards,
Ranjit
The beans must be “killed” before sweating. This is described in the process above…the beans are placed in 150°F water for 3 minutes, then put them in the plastic bags and then the sweat box.
It’s very important that the beans be fully ripe before picking and curing. If they are picked early or drop off of the vine, they are likely not going be of good quality.
Thank you. We pick the beans when one end start to turn yellow. If you keep for more days, then the end turns black and bean splits.
Will try again this year.
Regards,
That’s correct…just making sure you’re using ripe beans.
could you please make us a video of the curing process and we get to see how its actually done
This is a good idea…when we are in curing season, I will do that.
Are the beans ruined if I have fungus on them? I left them in the “sweat” box for 4 days, forgot to 1dry them. I am drying them now, but a few show fungus. Will they be ok or should I throw them out? Thanks
If it’s white mold you’re seeing, it’s not too bad, just cut it off and continue with the sweat. I’ve never seen this in the sweat, though, so if there is a “moldy” smell, you may want to throw them out. The white mold we see on occasion doesn’t have a smell, and we only see it on overripe beans after they have been dried and are aging.
Are you getting a good sweat? The moisture is glucose which will help prevent mold. Also, make sure the temperature is right…too cold or too hot can cause problems.
I,m Muhammad from Malaysia.I wish to thanks you very much Roland, for your good design for Making Vanilla Sweat Box. Without your help, I will never ever managed to have a ‘nice’ Vanilla Swear Box.
you are welcome, good luck with your vanilla!
Hi Roland,
We have a home garden and this year we got 25 beans. As they ripened, I stored them in freezer. Now they are ready for next steps. Please help, as so far (two times) we are not successful in getting fininshed product. The beans always turn out to be woody in flavour. Though while drying, they do smell of vanilla.
Regards,
First, this advice is for vanilla planifolia (just to make that clear). Woody beans usually indicates they were harvested too early. Make sure your beans are fully ripe before harvesting: the tips of the beans should be turning yellow and they look like they’re about to open.
When you are ready to cure the vanilla, get a large pot of water hot: 150°F (65°C) make sure you measure the temp, too hot will destroy the flavor. Put the frozen beans in there for a minute or so. You just want to get them hot, so take out the largest one and feel it, it should be hot. Soon as they are hot take them out of the water and let them drip. Put them into a plastic bag and the sweat box while they are still hot.
The article describes how to do the sweating.
Thank you
Can you sweat the beans using a towel in a sealed bag and submerged in a sous vide, since the temperature can be controlled precisely.
Yes, that seems possible, although I’ve never tried this.
I would not use the towel, since I think it best to keep the moisture in the process. This moisture is glucose, and in the dry cycle, it coats the bean surface and acts as a preservative. The second thing I would recommend there is use a ziplock bag (keep the zipper above the water probably) so you can take the beans out regularly for the 1 hour dry cycle in the dehydrator. If you don’t do this, there’s a chance the beans will begin to decompose.
I was thinking towel so that the moisture and glucose don’t become too much (like a soup) in a closed bag. The sweat box method recommended a towel under or around the beans. I guess it’ll be an experiment. I have time to wait, as my vines haven’t started making any flowers yet. Trying to research between now and then, Thanks!
Yes, it can get pretty wet in there at first, but with time all the moisture dries up. The approach I take is to hang on to all the moisture because I think it helps cure the beans better.
A key point to this is in the scald, beans that were overheated in the water kill will release all their moisture very quickly at the beginning of the sweat. We are very careful not to overheat the beans in the water kill.