Roman women inhaled the fumes of castoreum burned in lamps because they believed it would induce abortions (it didn’t). In a dead animal, the entire castoreum gland is removed and, traditionally, preserved by smoking it over a wood fire.įor much of its history, castoreum was used as a medicine. In a live animal, this fluid is milked and dried to a solid for perfume making. When castoreum is fresh, it’s a fluid that ranges in color from yellow and milky to grey and sticky, depending on the type of beaver and its gender. The Dystopian Surrealism of Zdzislaw Beksinski Beavers are so interested in the smell that historically, fur trappers would bait traps with castoreum. (The castoreum squirting out is apparently so loud, you can hear it if you’re standing nearby.) Beavers also use the fatty, waxy secretion to waterproof their fur.Īn odorous combination of vanilla and raspberry with floral hints, castoreum carries information about a beaver’s health and helps to make distinctions between family members and outsiders. They use their castoreum in part to mark their territory, secreting it on top of mounds of dirt they construct on the edges of their home turf. Beavers can’t see or hear very well, but they have a great sense of smell-and as a result of their castoreum glands, they also smell great. The culprit behind this scare is a flavorant called castoreum-but what exactly is it, and is it worth all the fuss?Ĭastoreum is a substance secreted by male and female Alaskan, Canadian, and Siberian beavers from pouchlike sacs located near the base of their tails ( castor is the word for beaver in Latin). This also helps explain why flavor scientists turn to natural substances from wood and bark for vanilla flavoring.In September 2013, popular blogger “The Food Babe” released a video proclaiming that beavers “flavor a ton of foods at the grocery store with their little butthole!” Since then, the internet has been crowded with alarmist posts saying that beaver’s butts are used to flavor everything from soft drinks to vanilla ice cream. Since these are located very close to their anal glands - right between the pelvis and tail - the substance can contain anal gland secretions and urine.Ĭastoreum has a sweet, and sometimes musky, scent due to the beavers' diet, which consists mainly of bark and leaves - hence why there's a history of using it in perfumes. It's important to note that castoreum doesn't come from a beaver's anus - it comes from the animal's castor sacs. Not only that, but they all claimed that castoreum is "not used today in any form of vanilla sold for human food use." What's more, when the Vegetarian Resource Group (VRG) asked five companies about the ingredients in their vanilla flavorings in 2011, all five stated they don't use castoreum. 00000088 pounds per person, according to the 5th edition of Fenaroli's Handbook of Flavor Ingredients, consumption of castoreum was only about 292 pounds per year - or about. And vanilla is no exception.Īs of 2009, the total U.S. He said, many food companies use artificial flavors because extracting natural flavors from fruits and other plants is labor-intensive and expensive. McGorrin, PhD, a professor of flavor chemistry at Oregon State University and fellow at the American Chemical Society, was willing to speak with us. The career involves highly-specialized training for at least seven years and the flavor combinations they study and develop are considered top secret. There are only an estimated 400 or so working certified flavorists worldwide, according to the Society of Flavor Chemists. Natural flavors come from edible sources found in nature like fruits, vegetables, spices, herbs, leaves, and roots, whereas artificial flavors are produced in a lab where certified flavor chemists or "flavorists," experiment with chemical combinations. There are a limited number of flavor chemists in the world who develop the artificial flavorings in many of our favorite processed food. Account icon An icon in the shape of a person's head and shoulders.
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