Certain things are unique to professional kitchens, confined to the cold lighting of stainless-steel galleys, rarely seeing the light of day: tepid coffee drunk from plastic quart containers. Blue-striped towels frayed at the edges like ancient papyrus. But perhaps my favorite industry secret, and one I call upon to level up my baked goods, is vanilla powder. Not beans, not extract, and not paste. Powder.<\/em><\/p>\n Recently I tried a new-to-me brand of vanilla powder from Beyond Good, the first version I\u2019ve seen specifically for home bakers. I swapped out my extract for a dash of the precious powder in my go-to vanilla cake recipe to give it a spin. Specks of vanilla peppered the cake, lending it an alluring aroma akin to fresh beans. One taste and I was hooked, reminded why professional bakers have been gatekeeping this wonder ingredient as their own.<\/p>\n Beyond Good<\/p>\n Pure Ground Vanilla Powder<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Vanilla powder (also called vanilla bean powder) is the entire bean\u2014pod, beans (a.k.a. caviar), and all\u2014dried and blitzed up into a powder. This not only makes the product a sustainable option (no waste!), but it also makes it an inexpensive alternative to pricier forms of vanilla. It tastes, looks, and smells like vanilla bean, because it is.<\/em> Just far more accessible and user-friendly. (No slicing beans open, no scraping, and no worrying about the beans getting old and drying out.)<\/p>\n![\"Image](\"https:\/\/assets.bonappetit.com\/photos\/69f9eda0220acebf3fc9cb25\/3:4\/w_748%2Cc_limit\/Beyond%2520Good%2520Pure%2520ground%2520Vanilla%2520Powder.jpg\"\/)
<\/picture><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nWhat is vanilla powder?<\/h2>\n
![\"beyondgoodgroundvanilla\"](\"https:\/\/assets.bonappetit.com\/photos\/69fa2f7160e29a9c26d29440\/master\/w_1600%2Cc_limit\/beyond-good-ground-vanilla.jpg\"\/)
<\/picture><\/span><\/div>\n