You love the flavor of beaver anal glands

Vanilla lovers, I’m looking at you!

You’ve probably never heard of it, but there’s a yearly trivia competition for collegiate food science students. It’s kind of like sports, but for nerds.

And as a nerd, I was part of this trivia team for many, many years throughout my bachelor’s and PhD program.

Why do I bring this up today?

Because I still remember one particular question a good friend of mine buzzed into answer, “What’s the source of castoreum, a more economical alternative to vanilla extract?”

To which my friend meekly replied into a microphone “umm beaver anal glands!?”

I was petrified. My teammate had just said the words anal glands to the judges. Had she lost her mind?

To my surprise, and delight, she was correct. Four points added to our score!

What is castoreum?

If you want the scientific answer, castoreum is the secretion from beaver anal glands and castor sacs. However, I prefer to think of it simply as beaver butt juice. It’s what the animal uses to mark…