Why is there alcohol in vanilla extract

You may have heard that a woman was arrested for driving under the influence of vanilla extract (see news article here). How did this happen?! To read more about DUIs, check out Matheson & Associates’s blog post. Probably one of the most head scratching details of this article was that vanilla extract contains 35% alcohol! To put this in perspective Jagemeister is 35% alcohol. Why can we buy vanilla extract at the grocery store?

Interestingly enough vanilla extract does depend on alcohol to extract the essential flavors and fragrances from the vanilla bean. And, it’s required by law to have an alcohol content of at least 35%. But vanilla extract is not regulated by the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax Bureau (TTB).

During Prohibition the Flavor and Extracts Manufacturers Association lobbied politicians to allow them to keep operating under the alcohol ban. The Flavors Association argued that unless alcohol used in flavor extracts were exempted from the strict Prohibition laws, then the food industry would take a serious hit. The constant persuading from lobbyists worked- the Volstead Act included a clause that made an exemption for flavor extracts. The flavor extracts, however, had to be non-potable and something a reasonable person would not drink.

Because vanilla extract is not an alcohol beverage, it falls under the control of the Food and Drug Administration as a food product rather than the TTB.

The amount of alcohol in vanilla extract depends on the brand. One gallon of pure vanilla extra should contain at least 35% alcohol, 65% water, and 13.35 oz. vanilla beans. Have no fear though! The alcohol content gets evaporated during cooking or baking. A small amount of alcohol actually gets ingested inside your body, so it’s not harmful.

What about imitation vanilla?

To put it simply, it’s gross. Although cheaper than pure vanilla, the imitation version is made from synthetic vanilla. Synthetic vanilla can come from wood pulp waste, coal tar, cow poop, secretions from a beaver’s castor glands, clove oil, pine bark, or fermented bran. Read more here.

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If you have any questions please do not hesitate to email me at or or call 919-335-5291.

To learn more about DUIs and DWIs (specifically in Wake County, North Carolina) check out Matheson & Associates PLLC. Call 919-335-5291 or email to speak to an attorney.

With the recent release of some alcohol-flavored products by non-alcoholic ice cream brands, it came to our attention that some of these products advertise an alcohol content that’s, well, pretty non-alcoholic. Why would you want alcohol-flavored ice cream without the buzz, we wondered?

But this post isn’t about bashing any other products–no matter how inferior they are to Arctic Buzz. 😉

What this post is about is alcohol and getting your buzz on with the best alcoholic ice cream around (that’s us!). Did you know that you can even get some alcohol content from regular vanilla ice cream? Maybe that’s why everyone loves vanilla so much…

Read more below to see why even regular old vanilla ice cream flavor contains a little bit of alcohol.

Pure vanilla extract has a 35% alcohol content.

The alcohol level found in vanilla extract exists because of the vanilla bean itself.

There are a lot of imitation vanilla products on the market, even if they’re labeled as pure vanilla–particularly if they come from Mexico or the Caribbean. The best vanilla extract comes from Madagascar, and it has 35% alcohol content by volume–a level that’s maintained byThe FDA.

At Arctic Buzz, we use only the finest vanilla. Not even extract. We use the Madagascar vanilla bean itself. And we make our ice cream completely from scratch.

Even vanilla flavor powders have alcohol in them.

Natural vanilla contains a few hundred compounds that contribute to its classic flavor profile, the most important of which is something called “vanillin”–typically an extract of wood pulp. Companies aiming for the mass market will use cheap vanillin powders to approximate the complex flavor of real vanilla extract, but vanillin still contains 35% alcohol (some vanillin may contain glycerin instead of alcohol). So it lacks the complex flavor profile of pure vanilla extract, but it often still comes with the alcohol content.

This doesn’t mean that your regular ice cream will be 35% alcohol by volume, as the vanillin or vanilla extract will be mixed with other ingredients and emulsifiers to make the ice cream. But there’s still some there if it’s not burned off during the manufacturing process.

Let’s take a look at this excerpt from Nestle’s website:

“Alcohol is used during the making of our ice cream as an ingredient in the finished product or as a carrier in a flavour. Our products with ‘flavour’ listed in the ingredient list, whether it is part of the ice cream base, coating or wafers, may contain alcohol used as a carrier” (Nestle).

Even Nestle, a mass-market ice cream producer, says their ice cream products might contain alcohol.

The FDA has strict rules about what is and what is not real vanilla extract.

The FDA doesn’t mess around when it comes to defining what is and isn’t vanilla. Seriously. Respect.

They talk about solutions, ethyl alcohol, semisolids… it’s probably just easier to check out their full requirements for pure vanilla here if you’re interested.

Alcoholic ice cream, liquor-infused ice cream, booze ice cream: we’re here to enlighten. And to get you buzzed with our alcoholic ice cream flavors and recipes.

Not only does our vanilla ice cream start with pure vanilla, it comes with vodka built right in. So for vodka-flavored ice cream to use for your vanilla ice cream cocktails, make sure you start with pure vanilla ice cream with a base alcohol content–make it Arctic Buzz vanilla ice cream.

See the rest of our alcoholic ice cream flavors here.