Rustic charm at One Leicester Street

Pure Vanilla provides an in-depth guide to vanilla including its species, origins, history and tasting notes. The author, Shauna Sever, is an American baking blogger and former investigative journalist and TV presenter. There are 85 recipes in the book, split into six chapters (breakfasts, cakes and pies, cookies and bars, candies and confections, custards and creams, drinks), across 160 pages. Here are a few facts about vanilla from the book: The Totonac Indians were credited as the first to discover vanilla. They then introduced their techniques for working with vanilla to their conquerors the Aztecs. Vanilla was produced exclusively in Mexico until 1836 when the secrets of its pollination was…