Found this thread just now. I grow cloves, black pepper and vanilla, and it’s fascinating to read about how others use it, value it, and talk about it. 
3 Likes
Details, please.
2 Likes
Well, details I’m not sure what you meant by that 
Anyway vanilla was harvested in November, and the next will again be somewhere in December. Harvested the cloves 3 weeks ago. Now the season is almost over. Everyone has either sold them fresh, or sundrying to add value. I still have around 10 kilogrammes of dried cloves from this season.
Peppers still being harvested. I don’t have much but guess there could be something like 10kgs.
I can post some photos
4 Likes
Oh yes, photos please!!
3 Likes
Do you sell your harvest is part of what/why I was asking.
1 Like
It’s night now I’ll post some photos tomorrow for sure
Yeah we sell to wholesalers who in turn export them for a huge profit.
Sometimes we keep them until the price goes up. For example cloves and black pepper is cheap these days and therefore many people keep them dried.
But vanilla is a different story. Vanilla should be sold on the same day harvested because it should be cured within 3 days. Else you don’t get that rich oily quality and flavour. And curing vanilla is a really time consuming process and need expertise in it. So we cannot keep them, we must sell them whatever the price is.
5 Likes
Very cool. I envy your harvest.
1 Like
Oh, those are beautiful plants! You are doing a terrific job with them! I can almost smell the fragrances!
1 Like
How beautiful! Thanks for sharing with us!
1 Like
How beautiful.
Where are you located? I know nothing about growing vanilla except the most famous environments (Madagascar, Tahiti and Mexico) are all places I’d like to be.
2 Likes
@heidicooksandbakes Cloves are really fragrant but the tree i recommend you grow for fragrance is coffee. Coffee flowers have a really divine fragrance that spreads throughout the area when the trees are in bloom. Whole garden smells beautiful when coffee flowers are there.
@MsBean I’m from Sri Lanka, a small island nation in the Indian ocean. Vanilla is a popular plant in the upcountry, and people are increasingly growing it everywhere. But tea, cloves, and coffee have been here since the colonial times. Ceylon tea is still a well regarded tea in the world.
@Rooster I am not growing it as a plantation but yes we have several clove trees
@CurlzNJ I can take many photos but didn’t post them to save server space. Else the admins will kick me 
Will post more later.
8 Likes
Are you familiar with
4 Likes
I had the same thought!
1 Like
Very interesting about Sri Lanka. I know the other vanilla-producing countries through work as those are the extracts we sell. I’ve even taught a vanilla tasting class so that customers could compare the differences in the varieties. They are quite different. How would you describe the Sri Lankan vanilla flavor? I am very intrigued.
2 Likes
From my experience I’m a little bit skeptical about “organizations” that “help” farmers or craftspeople. They never buy from the real ones, instead they have their own set of producers who have made deals with them, and others are not easily accepted. Maybe this company is not so, but 99.9% of them (for me 100%) are. Those “farmers” are actually middlemen who know how to communicate with the company.
Anyway thanks a lot for the info I will contact them to see if I can sell them my cloves and pepper. Really appreciate.
5 Likes
I’m not very much familiar with varieties but it’s said that Sri Lanka grows the Madagascar variety. We always put a row vanilla bean in the tea leaves bottle, and it cures into a professionally cured oily high quality one. And the tea is strongly infused with vanilla flavour.
The reason why we don’t know much about flavour is that we never cure them, and honestly never use them in anything as the harvest is sold on the same day harvested. And then the collectors cure them and sell abroad which comes to you canned or packeted. To understand the value added by curing, we sell the fresh beans for around 25USD per kilogramme. And a kilogramme of cured beans is sold for above 200USD. That’s the lowest grade. Highest grade goes for around 350USD.
I’ll send you a fresh vanilla bean in December
3 Likes
That is a vicarious thrill for me. Thanks for sharing it.
1 Like
They are a fairly new company. As this thread began with my own interest in their mission I became a customer. The two gents running the org are extremely approachable. Good luck on your inquiry.
4 Likes
