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Bitter Almond Flavor: This is the Difference to Bitter Almond Oil

Bitter almond flavoring is a popular flavoring for baking and cooking. The aroma contains no animal ingredients and is therefore also suitable for vegetarian and vegan recipes. But is bitter almond flavoring also recommended?

Bitter almond flavor is one of the typical baking ingredients. It smells and tastes like marzipan, almonds and sugar. The aroma is highly concentrated, so just a few drops are enough. For this reason, bitter almond flavoring is almost always available in small bottles that allow you to accurately measure the flavor on the drops. Bitter almond flavoring is popular as an ingredient in sweet recipes:

Marble cake and other sponge cakes
coconut macaroons
amarettini
nut snails
Recipes with marzipan
jams
But what is the bitter almond flavor made of and how does it differ from bitter almond oil? We explain this in detail in the following sections.

Bitter almond flavor: These ingredients are in the bottle

Bitter almond flavoring is not typically a natural flavoring, but is almost always created in a lab. It consists of two substances:

Benzaldehyde (about 20 percent)
Vegetable oil (about 80 percent)
Benzaldehyde is a clear liquid that is transparent to light yellow. Their smell and taste are reminiscent of bitter almonds and give their name to the bitter almond aroma. Real almonds or rum, on the other hand, are not in the baking aroma. The bottle with the bitter almond flavor does not contain sugar either, so you have to sweeten your recipes yourself.

Benzaldehyde is officially approved as a food additive. In addition, it is often found in perfumes and essential oils and naturally in the pits of peaches and apricots, explains the Federal Environment Agency. According to Stiftung Warentest, it is also found in food as a cherry flavoring substance. It can be produced naturally (“natural aroma”), but is usually produced chemically in the laboratory (“aroma”). In large amounts, benzaldehyde can be toxic, causing damage to the nervous system and respiratory problems. According to Stiftung Warentest, the European Food Safety Authority has classified benzaldehyde in small quantities as non-critical.

Tip: In many cases, you can simply omit bitter almond flavoring. If you still want to use it, pay attention to the addition “natural aroma” and use it sparingly.

Bitter almond flavor or bitter almond oil?

Bitter almond flavoring and bitter almond oil are not identical. The important difference is in the composition:

Bitter almond oil can also be made naturally or artificially. However, it contains highly toxic hydrocyanic acid, while bitter almond flavor does not.
If the hydrocyanic acid is removed from bitter almond oil, the chemical can be used as a fragrance in perfumes and as a flavoring for liqueurs. The bitter almond oil then contains 99 percent benzaldehyde.
Bitter almond oil is also not identical to almond oil. So it cannot be used as a care product for external use.
Note: Untreated bitter almond oil is not commercially available. Bitter almond oil without prussic acid is much less common than bitter almond flavoring and should be used with caution because of the high benzaldehyde content. Bitter almond flavor is easier to use.

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Food

Why You Shouldn’t Eat Nuts That Taste Bitter

Bitter-tasting nuts can have negative health consequences. We explain how you should deal with bitter nuts and which regional nut varieties are best for consumption.

Bitter nuts can be harmful to your health. They may contain mold or toxins. If the nuts are also stored warm and moist, they can release so-called mycotoxins. These are certain mold toxins that are produced during the metabolism of mold. A distinction is made between different mycotoxins, including aflatoxin, for example.

If nuts are discolored or have a bad odor, do not eat them. But beware, the mold in mycotoxins can sometimes be recognized neither by its appearance nor by its smell. However, a bitter taste or discoloration are signs of mycotoxins.

This is why bitter nuts can be bad for your health

According to the Federal Office for Consumer Protection, mycotoxins can affect the kidneys or liver, cause diarrhea or vomiting, weaken the immune system and, in the worst case, even promote the development of cancer. Therefore, you should definitely spit out bitter nuts immediately.

According to the agency, pistachios and peanuts are primarily affected by mycotoxins. Occasionally, however, the mold fungi can also be detected in walnuts and almonds. Therefore, you should be particularly careful with these four strains. Also make sure to always store nuts in a dry and cool place.

Nuts are healthy – if they don’t taste bitter

Nuts are a healthy snack in and of themselves, as long as they don’t taste bitter. They are mainly made up of fat and protein, which are good for the cardiovascular system. At the same time, they contain important dietary fibers that have a positive effect on digestion. However, many nut varieties have a poor ecological balance due to their long transport routes.

Nuts that are also grown in Europe include walnuts and hazelnuts. Almonds mostly come from California, but there are also Italian or Spanish ones. Therefore, for the sake of the environment, you should pay attention to the country of origin of the nuts. An organic certification guarantees you organic cultivation without the use of chemical-synthetic pesticides. With the Fairtrade seal, you also support decent working conditions and fair wages.

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Cooking Tips

Bitter Almonds are Poisonous – So You Can Still Eat Them

Bitter almonds are poisonous when raw due to the hydrocyanic acid. Cooked or baked, however, they are used in many traditional recipes. Here you can find out when you can eat bitter almonds and what to look out for.

Bitter almonds are valued for their intense almond flavor and, despite their toxic effect, are often used as a baking ingredient. This is possible because the toxic substance largely evaporates when heated. In contrast to baking flavors, you get a natural and less dominant bitter almond taste. We’ll show you what you absolutely have to consider when seasoning with bitter almonds.

Bitter Almonds: Inedible when raw

Bitter almonds are closely related to the sweet almonds and like these fruits of the almond tree. Visually, the two subspecies can often hardly be distinguished, with the bitter almond being slightly smaller than the sweet almond. Some bitter specimens can also be found among sweet almonds, which also contain hydrocyanic acid and should not be eaten raw. If you bite into a very bitter almond from a packet of sweet almonds, it’s best to spit it out.

Bitter almonds contain around three to five percent amygdalin, i.e. hydrocyanic acid bound to sugar residues, which is toxic when raw. During digestion, the highly toxic hydrocyanic acid is split off, which can cause serious symptoms of poisoning even in small quantities. In addition to hydrocyanic acid (or hydrogen cyanide), benzaldehyde is also split off. Both substances have the typical bitter almond taste, which is reminiscent of marzipan and is popular in many baking recipes. In contrast to hydrocyanic acid, benzaldehyde is not toxic and is used as a bitter almond aroma (also called false bitter almond oil) for baking.

According to the Lower Saxony State Office for Consumer Protection and Food Safety (LAVES), the hydrogen cyanide content of raw bitter almonds is up to 3000 milligrams per kilogram. Depending on body weight, 5 to 10 bitter almonds can be deadly for children. This number is higher for adults, but you should definitely avoid raw bitter almonds. In the trade, the bitter seeds are usually only offered in small packs of 50 grams. You can buy bitter almonds in the health food store or in the pharmacy.

By the way: Bitter apricot kernels also contain amygdalin. Studies by LAVES have shown that their hydrocyanic acid content is comparable to that of bitter almonds. The Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) warns against eating more than two apricot kernels a day; tolerance is significantly lower in children. The same applies to raw bitter almonds.

Cooking or baking bitter almonds: this is how you can eat them

Since hydrocyanic acid is very sensitive to heat, it evaporates when cooking or baking and only a very small proportion of the toxic substance remains. You can therefore consume small amounts in heated dishes without hesitation. For example, you can use bitter almonds to flavor pastries, liqueurs or other desserts. Traditionally, bitter almonds are incorporated into Christmas stollen, amaretti and liqueurs, among other things.

You can process bitter almonds by grinding them finely or grating them with the other ingredients like fresh nutmeg with a fine grater. The food must then be heated. Alternatively, you can heat the kernels separately in the oven and use them to refine cold desserts. Depending on how intense the bitter almond taste should be, you can calculate around 5 to 15 grams of bitter almonds per 500 grams of mass. This amount is completely harmless after heating.

Below you will find a recipe for aromatic cantuccini with bitter almonds without artificial flavorings.

Cantuccini with bitter almonds: recipe without artificial baking flavors

Ingredients:

250 g flour
125 gsugar
1 teaspoon Baking powder
0.5 tsp salt
10 g bitter almonds
2organic eggs
20 gorganic butter (soft)
0.5 vanilla bean
200 g almonds
Zest of an organic lemon (optional)

Directions:

Place the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl and mix together.
Finely grind the bitter almonds or use a very fine grater to grate them into the dry ingredients. Mix everything thoroughly.
Add the organic eggs, the softened butter and the pulp of half a vanilla pod (alternatively, you can also use a pinch of homemade vanilla sugar) and knead all the ingredients together. For a special aroma you can add the zest of an organic lemon. Knead in the whole sweet almonds at the end.
Chill the dough for half an hour.
Preheat the oven to 190°C top/bottom heat. In the meantime, divide the dough into five portions, roll them into four centimeter thick strands and place them on a baking tray lined with a baking paper alternative or baking paper. Leave some space between the rolls as the pastries will rise in the oven.
Bake the rolls for about 12 to 15 minutes, let them cool slightly and cut them into slices about 1.5 centimeters wide.
Place them cut-side up on the baking sheet and bake for another 10 minutes until golden brown. Allow the cantuccini to cool completely before packing in an airtight container.

Alternatives to bitter almonds: bitter almond flavor

Due to the toxic hydrogen cyanide, many prefer to use bitter almond flavoring when baking, which tastes the same but does not contain any of the toxic substances found in bitter almonds.

You can also use bitter almond oil, which is obtained from the kernels of bitter almonds, apricots or other stone fruit. Bitter almond oil consists mainly of benzaldehyde, but also contains toxic hydrocyanic acid. Thanks to the intense almond aroma, it is used as a spice oil in food production but also in perfumery. Important: If you want to use bitter almond oil for food, you must heat it up before consumption.

Tip: The oil can be freed from the hydrocyanic acid using special processes. You can therefore also find bitter almond oil free of hydrocyanic acid in stores.

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Food

11 Uknown Facts About Bitter Orange

The bitter orange is a medium-sized evergreen tree, reaching up to 10 m in height. Indoors do not exceed 1 m. The crown is highly branched, spherical, with a spiral arrangement of leaves. The branches have thin, long thorns. Leaves are elliptical, pointed, dense, leathery, alternate. Smooth, shiny, bright green above, light green below with translucent containers of essential oil. Attached to wide-winged, long petioles.

  1. Orange has other names: sour orange, bitter orange, bigaradia, chinotto.
  2. The homeland of this citrus is India, where the plant was cultivated several hundred years ago. Today the orange fruit is grown in many tropical and subtropical countries. In Russia, the distribution of the orange is especially widespread in the southern regions, where it is grown as a houseplant. Not found in the wild.
  3. At home, it grows in the form of a miniature slender tree or a compact spectacular bush. Large, fragrant, white, and pink-orange flowers give it decorativeness, which looks very elegant against the background of bright green foliage.
  4. Fresh orange fruit is not used, it is valued because of its zest. To obtain it, the peel is separated from the pulp and dried for several days in a dry, warm place, spreading out in a thin layer on a flat surface.
  5. The rind is considered finished when it becomes thin and fragile. Now you can get zest from it. The main use of orange fruit is in the manufacture of various desserts and pastries.
  6. From the leaves and flowers of this plant, essential oils are obtained, which are used in aromatherapy and the preparation of marmalade.
  7. Unripe fruits that fall from the tree are used to make essential oil used in the production of alcoholic beverages.
  8. The orange flower is considered a symbol of innocence and is a traditional part of the bride’s wedding bouquet. The scent of the flowers of this tree in Japanese poetry is associated with memories of the past. Earlier, orange petals were used to fill the pockets of wide sleeves.
  9. Another interesting fact about the orange is that you can see its image on the coat of arms of the city of Lomonosov.
  10. Bitter orange fruits are harvested unripe when they reach 1 cm in diameter, then dried in the sun. The peel is removed from ripe fruits, and after drying it is thoroughly peeled from the white inner layer.
  11. The finished raw materials are used in the cosmetic, food industry, and medicine.
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Food

Chicory: Bitter Salad Pleasure

Attention salad fans: Even in the winter months you don’t have to go without enjoying the leaves, because there are chicory varieties. These tolerate the cold well and are full of health-promoting ingredients. Grab it!

Delicious winter salad

Chicory varieties include radicchio, endive and chicory. These usually bitter winter lettuce are harvested in late autumn and are therefore a tasty alternative to lettuce and leaf lettuce, which wither quickly. In addition, chicory salads keep longer than their summer counterparts because they have a firmer texture.

Chicory provides a vitamin kick

If you want to fill up your depot of vitamins and minerals, you should definitely use chicory varieties. Their high content of vitamins A, B, and C strengthens the immune system.

They also contain the bitter substance inhibin, which has a positive effect on the blood and the production of bile. The winter salads are real slimming guarantees because they are low in calories and fat.

Delicacy to nibble on

Chicory varieties such as radicchio, chicory, and Co. taste both warm and cold. Strong dressings complete the intense taste.

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Bitter Substances: That’s Why They’re so Healthy

Bitter tasting foods are not very popular with many people. However, the bitter substances it contains have a very positive effect on our health and can prevent numerous diseases.

What are bitter substances?

As the name suggests, the key characteristic of all bitter substances is their bitter taste. They are found in many different plants and are often used in herbal remedies. Bitter substances are generally said to improve blood circulation and digestion and to stimulate the appetite. They also have an anti-inflammatory and antibacterial effect.

Foods that provide you with a considerable amount of bitter substances are e.g.:
chicory
artichokes
grapefruits
iceberg lettuce
Spices, such as ginger, fennel, cinnamon and cardamom
Medicinal herbs such as yarrow, hops and dandelion
Bitters are also available as dietary supplements and can be swallowed as pills and capsules. However, this is not recommended, as the positive effects are largely triggered by chewing the food in the mouth. Even the bitter taste that we perceive through our tongue has a digestive effect and stimulates the production of gastric juices and bile.

Bitter substance cynarin for liver and bile

The bitter substance cynarin is found in large quantities in artichokes and has many positive effects on health:
The bitter substance promotes the formation of bile and thus stimulates digestion. Cynarin is an effective remedy, especially for bloating, flatulence and other digestive problems.
Cynarin has a protective effect on the liver. It may even support the regeneration of liver cells. However, this has not yet been scientifically clarified.
There is evidence that regular use of Cynarin lowers LDL cholesterol and helps raise “good” HDL cholesterol levels. With its antihypertensive effect, the bitter substance therefore plays an important role in the prevention of arteriosclerosis.
You can get cynarin by eating artichoke hearts. If you don’t like them, you can also add the substance in the form of extracts or as artichoke juice.

The bitter substance in grapefruit: naringin

The bitter substance naringin is mainly found in grapefruit and pomelos. If it is broken down in the stomach, it produces the secondary plant substance naringenin. This is associated with a number of positive health effects:
Like all flavonoids, naringenin is also said to have an antioxidant effect. Antioxidants neutralize free radicals in our body, which allows them to protect us from oxidative stress and the diseases that result from it.
Naringenin also has a cholesterol-lowering effect and thus prevents cardiovascular diseases.
Like all bitter substances, naringin also has positive effects on our digestive system. There is even evidence that naringenin can prevent colon cancer.
Note: Taking naringin with some medicines may make them less effective. In such cases, talk to your doctor beforehand about the extent to which eating grapefruit is safe for you.

Lactucin as a natural pain reliever

Lactucin is found in many bitter-tasting leafy greens, such as iceberg lettuce, endive, radicchio, chicory, and frisée. The bitter substance has a calming and anti-inflammatory effect. In addition, studies prove the positive effects in neurodegenerative diseases. There is evidence that lactucin promotes the growth of nerve processes.

Lactucin also has a strong pain-relieving effect. In an experiment in which the bitter substance was administered to mice, it came relatively close to the effects of conventional painkillers.

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Food

Cucumber Tastes Bitter: When to Stop Eating it

If the cucumber tastes bitter, caution is advised. We explain to you how long the vegetables can be kept, where the bitter taste can come from and when you should stop eating cucumbers.

That’s why cucumbers sometimes taste bitter

Originally, cucumbers were rich in harmful bitter substances, the cucurbitacins, which are typical of the pumpkin family. Modern breeds now contain very few of these bitter substances. That’s a good thing, because according to the Federal Center for Nutrition (BZfE) they can be toxic to humans in higher concentrations.

Cucumbers from the supermarket are usually not bitter. If you grow cucumbers in your own garden, they may develop bitter substances, for example due to incorrect fertilization. The cucumbers then taste bitter.
This can also be the case if you buy home-grown cucumbers that have been incorrectly fertilized at an organic farmer’s market or in an organic store.
If a cucumber tastes bitter, you should stop eating it. Symptoms such as stomach cramps or diarrhea can occur if you consume too many of the harmful bitter substances.

Shelf life and storage of cucumbers

Cucumbers are sensitive to cold. It is therefore best not to store them below ten degrees Celsius, otherwise they can become watery and soft.

If you want to store cucumbers in the fridge, use the crisper drawers. It is usually not as cold there as in the rest of the refrigerator. Otherwise, store the cucumbers in a cool room with high humidity.
It is best to eat the cucumbers fresh. If you can’t use them fresh, you should only store them for a few days before using them.
Cucumbers are not suitable for freezing. They lose their structure in the process and become mushy when they thaw again.
Cucumbers are sensitive to ethylene. Therefore, do not keep them with fruits like apples that emit ethylene or they will spoil faster.
When buying cucumbers, make sure they aren’t bruised or damaged if you don’t want to use them right away.
In principle, as long as the cucumbers don’t taste bitter, are too mushy or moldy, you shouldn’t throw them away. You can also roast or stew slightly older cucumbers as a side dish or use them in a cucumber salad.

Cucumbers belong to the gourd family and originally come from northern India. They have about 97 percent water content and are very low in calories at twelve kilocalories per 100 grams.
Healthy ingredients such as provitamin A and various minerals are located directly under the skin of the cucumber.
You should therefore not peel cucumbers, just wash them thoroughly. When buying cucumbers, also pay attention to organic quality so that no synthetic pesticides and other pollutants get into your body.

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Food

Preparing Green Tea: This is How it Does Not Become Bitter

Preparing green tea takes a lot of learning: you have to pay attention to a few things when it comes to the infusion and the temperature so that the green tea doesn’t become bitter and the desired effect occurs.

Green tea is said to have many positive effects on the metabolism, fat burning and the immune system. Since it contains caffeine, it also wakes you up and is better tolerated than coffee.

If you want to prepare green tea in the traditional Japanese way, there are a lot of things to consider: the type of tea, the brewing time, the water quality, the temperature and the amount of tea. The teapot can also affect the taste.

Preparing green tea: that’s what matters

The water temperature and brewing time are particularly important when preparing green tea. If it brews too long, it becomes bitter. If it is too short, it hardly tastes good. If the water is too hot, good ingredients such as antioxidants or tanning agents are dissolved. If the water is too cold, these substances are not bound in the water and your tea has no effect.

For a good green tea you have to pay attention to the following:

Use low lime water
Brewing time: Depends on the type of tea, but no longer than three minutes
Water temperature: depending on the type of tea between 60 and 90 degrees Celsius
Amount of tea: 1 -2 teaspoons loose tea or 1 tea bag (approx. 10 g)
Amount of water: depending on the type of tea, one cup to one pot
In most cases, the packaging states how much tea needs to be brewed, for how long and at what degrees.

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Food

The Bitter Truth About Tea

Exploitation, poverty, environmental destruction: That is the true price for our tea enjoyment – and others pay it. We show why responsible consumers should spend their money on fair tea instead of cheap tea.

Strictly speaking, “tea” is only the infusion made from the leaves of the tea plant, i.e. black tea, green tea, white tea and oolong. So the following post is about that. Because especially with the tea plant, the cultivation and processing conditions are often criticized.

The reasons are of a geographical and economic nature: Today, tea comes mainly from China, India, Sri Lanka, Kenya and Vietnam (see FAO) – countries in which social and environmental standards are comparatively low or compliance is rarely monitored. The tea market is dominated by a few large corporations, in particular Unilever, the Tata Group and Associated British Foods. This gives these companies a lot of power, for example to enforce their ideas about prices and production conditions.

Tea often means exploitation and poverty

A prerequisite for employees to be able to protect their interests against such powerful corporations is that they can organize themselves. In a study, the Catholic aid organization Misereor writes that on many Asian and African tea plantations, employee representatives such as unions and works councils are being obstructed – in principle not a rare phenomenon in the plantation business. In 2019, however, Oxfam did report trade union activity in the Assam region of India.

Both organizations and a few others also report on diverse and widespread forms of discrimination on tea plantations, abuses of any kind do not seem to be uncommon.

There are hardly any living wages in the tea industry: the wages of plantation workers are often below the national minimum wage. Oxfam and the Rosa-Luxemburg-Foundation mention wages of less than 2 euros per day in different regions of India.

According to various research, there are usually services on the tea plantations that plantation companies agree with their employees, such as medical care, accommodation and food. But these are often deducted from wages, so that there is hardly any money left to live on. In addition, research by NGOs and journalists consistently shows that the shelter and food provided is inadequate.

All three organizations mentioned denounce the catastrophic nutritional situation of tea plantation workers. This is also a consequence of the practice of withholding wages under various pretexts. Many employees on tea plantations are therefore undernourished or malnourished, and an alarmingly large proportion of their children are physically underdeveloped.

Nobody likes it: poison in tea

On large tea plantations, the tea is harvested all year round. Those responsible spray plenty of pesticides to combat pests and optimize yields. Soil, water, biodiversity and the health of the plantation workers suffer from the chemicals. We consumers in Europe can also taste the rampant use of pesticides: Test institutes regularly find high levels of pesticides in tea samples.

Greenpeace India, for example, found residues of at least one pesticide in 94 percent of the tea samples examined in 2014, and even more than ten different pesticides in 60 percent. However, pesticides in our food are not necessarily harmless: some have been linked to various health problems such as cancer, hormonal imbalances and fertility disorders.

What to do?

So far, so sad. If you don’t want to let the problems surrounding the cultivation of the tea plant spoil your enjoyment of tea, you can definitely do something:

Buy organic tea to reduce the risk of exposure to pesticides. The organic certification prohibits the use of dangerous sprays and fertilizers. With the purchase, you strengthen organic agriculture in the countries of origin and contribute to reducing the use of poison.
Buy fair trade, organic tea. This is the best way to combat exploitative working conditions. However, it is not easy to make a concrete recommendation here, because in addition to the well-known Fairtrade seal, there are a variety of initiatives.

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