The Vanilla Beans

...Continued from yesterday:
    Upon our arrival in Los Angeles Tom and I were much anticipating jumping into the joys of hands-on grand parenting, such as walking our older grand daughter, and our grand dogs,

​...to the school yard;

...then picking up our grand daughter after school, meeting the class chicks,

...and marveling at the outdoor hallways,

​...and outdoor  coat and backpack-hangers, facilitated by the ever-balmy Southern California climate.

    We watched the girls play soccer,

...and we watched them just play.

      We helped with the household chores,

...and with the grocery shopping at Ralph's,

​...(where the parking lot full of palm trees never ceases to charm me),

...tossing in a grandparently treat or two among the healthy stuff,

...including ingredients to make chocolate chip cookies, during the procurement of which we made a gasp-inducing discovery: Look at the price of the vanilla extract! $24.99 for four ounces, $12.99 for two ounces!

    I looked up why the cost of vanilla extract is suddenly so crazy and learned that a combination of  civil unrest in Madagascar where the vanilla beans are grown and climate change have taken their toll on the vanilla vines, as have vanilla bean speculators who buy, hoard, and even steal what plants there are. All those factors have  driven the price of vanilla beans up to $600 per kilogram, higher than the price of silver.
    In fact it's feared that vanilla beans may be on the endangered list, especially if imitation vanilla flavoring takes over the market, leaving farmers no incentive to cultivate real vanilla anymore.
       In truth if I had known about the plight of the vanilla beans - and the vanilla farmers -  while I was shopping I'd likely have sprung the $12.99 for a small bottle of real vanilla, though I don't suppose my buying one bottle of expensive vanilla would have helped save the beans or the farmers.
     Anyway, I bought a bottle of imitation vanilla flavoring,

...which in fact worked well enough in the chocolate chip cookies as far as anyone could tell.

    Still it's sad to think that by the time our grandchildren are grown all the vanilla beans may be gone.
     And maybe not just the vanilla beans.

References:
https://spoonuniversity.com/lifestyle/why-vanilla-extract-is-so-expensive

https://vanillaqueen.com/expensive-vanilla/