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The Current Transcript for May 18, 2018

Host: Laura Lynch

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Listen to the full episode

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

At the end of the day I am just proud of who I am and where I come from and we have never put any focus on that. We've just focused on who we are as a couple.

LAURA LYNCH: That's the world's most famous bride to be Meghan Markle and all the world's eyes will be on her and her Prince Harry when they walk down the aisle in Windsor this weekend. In that BBC interview she explained that the two of them never put any focus on the fact she's about to become the first mixed raced member of the Royal British royal family. But plenty of others have and today we'll get into that and some of the complexities surrounding this happy occasion, with guests including a different sort of royal watcher; comedian and Daily Show British correspondent Gina Yashere. That's up first today. Then across a different pond, to Hawaii's big island.

SOUNDCLIP

See the lava explosion down there. We can see that [unintelligible] of red. We are watching active lava eruptions right now from the sky here.

LL: Coming up later in today's show I'll check in with someone who's running toward the explosions while the rest of Hawaii is running away. He calls himself a lava chaser, and we'll hear why climate change could mean that Canada's long dormant volcanos might be more likely to erupt someday. Plus.

SOUNDCLIP

One of the things that [unintelligible] real good is the specs of real vanilla beans. Each scoop contains as many vanilla specs as there are stars in the universe.

LL: If you are the kind of person who goes to the ice cream parlor and orders vanilla don't let anyone tell you you're unadventurous. You just have expensive taste. Yes, vanilla, the supposedly humble flavor has seen its price skyrocket lately. In an hour, we'll bring you the story behind the vanilla being Spike and what everyone from bakers to booze makers who rely on it are doing. I’m Laura Lynch in Vancouver and this is the Friday edition of The Current.

Should palace officials have done more to prepare Meghan Markle's family for the royal wedding?

Guests: Penny Junor, Gina Yashere

SOUNDCLIP

[Crowd cheering]

LL: And that's how it sounded when Meghan Markle and her fiancé Prince Harry briefly turned to wave at onlookers those in London earlier this year. And it's just a preview of the celebrations in store for this weekend when the two tie the knot at St. George's Chapel in Windsor England tomorrow. At least 100,000 people are expected to descend on the small town. And already royal super fans are camping out hoping to catch a glimpse of storybook magic. In a moment we'll hear from a veteran royal watcher, the author of a recent biography of Harry, as well as controversial books about Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles. But first we wanted a less conventional take on the royal union. To help us to explore how race, class and family dysfunction come into all of this, I'm joined by comedian Gina Yashere. She was born and raised in London to Nigerian parents and she has been a regular on many British chat shows. Now she is the British correspondent for The Daily Show with Trevor Noah. We have reached her in New York City. Hello Gina.

GINA YASHERE: Hello how are you doing?

LL: I am fine. You grew up in Britain, you are British, how excited are you for the royal wedding, tomorrow?

GINA YASHERE: Well, not that excited.

LL: Why not?

GINA YASHERE: It's just the way of life. Oh, yes, it's another royal... I mean I'm saying we're not excited, we're not happy with them, but like it's not as big a deal for us as people would think. I think Americans and Canadians love it.

LL: Given what you said, were you interested in the royal family growing up, then?

GINA YASHERE: My mom is a massive royalist. Well I was, in the 80s, you know when Prince Charles and Princess Diana got married, was it 1981, that was a massive thing. I was a child then. That was a big deal. There were street parties and all that stuff. Some parts of England do in the suburbs would be doing street parties and stuff. But I think we've moved on a lot since then.

LL: Well then did you buy into the fairy-tale wedding fantasy? Did your mother talk about it? Was that part of your reality?

GINA YASHERE: I had never dreamed to become a princess. So it wasn't a part of my fairy tale fantasy , but being born and raised in England and seeing what's happened in the world and the royal family is just as dysfunctional as most regular families. I was disavowed of that fairy-tale fantasy a long time ago.

LL: Now like admit to the fact that Meghan Markle is mixed race and I wonder how important you think it is that the royal family is now going to have a member who is mixed race.

GINA YASHERE: It's pretty fantastic. It's showing the world that the royal family is moving on. I mean obviously Meghan Markle is not the first person of color in the royal family. She's just the first acknowledged person of color. So it is great that she's coming in, she's being acknowledged for where she comes from. Her mother's going to take front seat at the wedding. And I think it's showing the world that the royal family is moving into the future which is great.

LL: Acknowledged? Who came before her?

GINA YASHERE: Princess Charlotte Sophia who was Queen Victoria's grandmother. Sorry not Princess Charlotte's of the Queen Charlotte Sophia. She was - they say rumored to be a Malate but she was a Malate. But they never talk about it but if you search backwards you'll find out that there was a black woman in the royal family.

LL: The media coverage you've been watching Mark, what jumps out at you about the way she's been covered?

GINA YASHERE: Ah Gosh! At the beginning though there was a lot of dog whistles racism in the coverage at the beginning. There was a lot stuff may that about but the fact that she was black and then they also used a lot of sort of stereotypical words and statements while referring to her. For instance some of the newspaper articles were saying Meghan Markle straight from the hood, almost straight out of Compton. It's like she was born nowhere near Compton. It's like saying someone from London is from Birmingham or something. Not even close. It was ridiculous. So they used a lot of stuff, they kept saying they kept calling her 'exotic' which in England when the newspapers used the word 'exotic' or 'dusky' or anything like that it usually means dark skinned, or not British, not white. So there was a lot of that stuff with the pope kept talking about her mother having dreadlocks, ‘OH! Her mother has dreadlocks'. Yes. So her mother lets her hair grow out of her head the way it grows laterally. What is the big deal about that? So there's a lot of that stuff going on. It's kind of come down recently after Prince Harry wrote an open letter saying stop with racism, stop with this harassment. It's calmed down a lot but now they've moved on to the other side of her family, and quite frankly the white side of Meghan Markle's family is super dysfunctional. They should be on Love and Hip Hop. You know Dad doesn't talk to her, his other kids, he doesn't talk to the mum. The brother is write in letters to Prince Harry telling him not to - all via a magazine obviously because they're all seem to be very money grabbing - and so the brother has written a letter to Prince Harry via the magazine saying, don't marry my sister, she's nowhere near as genuine as Princess Diana. Like he knew Princess Diana personally. The dad has been caught out trying to pre-sell pictures of him getting ready for the wedding. Her sisters were in a book damning her and also accused her of being snobby for inviting them to the wedding. And I am like, if you want my family I wouldn't invite you to the wedding. The brother has been arrested for holding a gun to his fiancé’s head. I mean I wouldn't invite you to my worst enemy's wedding. So press are going crazy over that Meghan's family right now and how dysfunctional they are.

LL: And the focus comes of her. I want to read you a quote from Kehinde Andrews, he's a sociologist at the University of Birmingham and he says this is the quote: "Meghan Markle is a beautiful woman but the royal family doesn't change because you have a splash of coffee. She isn't a dark skinned woman with an afro. She looks like Pippa Middleton and dresses like Diana". So that's the quote. Do you think it makes a difference how black Megan Merkel is perceived to be?

GINA YASHERE: Oh most definitely, most definitely. I am not saying that because she's mixed race she's any less black. I'm not saying that at all. But it's not like Harry has decided to marry Lupita Nyong'o, do you know what I mean? She very much fits into the European idea of beauty as in she's super light skinned. Her hair was super straight. Her features are very narrow. She's as close to looking European as a black woman could possibly be. So she fit - even though she is mixed race - she still fits that European ideal. So it's not like it's a massive changes, not like Harry went to Nigeria and Kenya and married a 100 percent full blooded a big low fat lipped afro or dreadlocks wearing black woman, it is that so. You know I think Meghan still fits into that ideal. And so it kind of dilutes down the effect a little bit.

LL: And yet there are a lot of black women celebrating Meghan Markle joining the royal family there is a hashtag, #BlackPrincess, going around. What kinds of things have you been hearing? Are there lots of, especially in the U.K., black women who think that this is a good thing?

GINA YASHERE: Oh yeah we all definitely think it's a great thing. I'm not saying it's not a great. Meghan Markle is still black. She's still considered black because her mother is black. I mean how she chooses to identify herself. Mixed race people, people of mixed parents, mixed heritage, they chose, a lot of them will chose how they want to be perceived and how they want to be classified. So but Meghan is of mixed parentage. So black women 'We're taking it. That's one for us. That's one for the team'.

LL: A recent polls that came out from the Huffington Post and it suggested Meghan Markle is tied with Prince Charles as the least popular royal and I am wondering if you accept that. Why do you think the British public hasn't embraced her as much as other members of the royal family?

GINA YASHERE: Because she's black? I don't know why everybody thinks that just because it's a black person go into the royal family we're now a post racial world. That's not the case. In fact if you look at what happened after Obama was president and what happened afterwards. We went backwards. And now we've got Trump. It's like the racism is racism but that anger has been bubbling under the surface has now just exploded into the forefront and angry white people have gained their revenge that way. And that's the same kind of things that's happening with Meghan Markle. She's the least, one of the least popular, because of her race.

LL: If you could give her any advice as she goes into this new role in her life what would you tell her?

GINA YASHERE: .Get out. It's too late. There's not much I can do actually Literally, it's a matter of you're marrying the man you love, concentrate on that and just enjoy your relationship. Forget everybody else though. They'll have to come round to you eventually. That's how it's going to be.

LL: Now you know getting up for the wedding but I'm wondering as you as you look upon events tomorrow, when you do get up, what are you going to be watching for?

GINA YASHERE: If she watching to see how many black people there will be in a church.

LL: What's your best guess?

GINA YASHERE: One. Meghan and her mother. But I'm hoping that you know a few Nigerians sneak in. 'She's my cousin. You don't know but she's my cousin I am coming into the wedding'.

LL: Maybe your mother will sneak in.

GINA YASHERE: That's what I'm hoping. I'm sure we must be distant relatives, we are all related in some way.

LL: Gina thanks very much for talking to us.

GINA YASHERE: No problem. Thank you.

LL: Bye bye. Gina Yashere is a stand-up comedian and British correspondent for The Daily Show with Trevor Noah. Her new special is part of the Netflix series the stand ups. And we reached her in New York City. Well Gina Yashere may not be too enthused about the wedding but the British media has been dominated with news about the royal couple for weeks, and it's not just the tabloids it is every media outlet and there are documentaries and even a lifetime movie.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: What am I supposed to do? Never have fun?

VOICE 2: Peter Pan can't stay in Neverland forever. The [unintelligible] isnt so bad.

[Song plays]

VOICE 2: I am Meghan.

VOICE 1: Harry. You look lovely.

VOICE 3: She's American, she's divorced.

CROWD MEMBER: [unintelligible] Prince Harry.

VOICE 2: I ain't ready for this.

[Song plays]

VOICE 1: She makes me happy so to hell with traditions.

LL: All the drama. Will leave it to the critics to judge the merits of that but my next guest has the lowdown on the real life version of this latest royal love story. Penny Junor is a veteran royal biographer. Her books include Harry: Brother, Soldier, Son and the Duchess, the Untold Story. She'll be in Windsor tomorrow to cover the wedding. Today we reached her in Wiltshire. Hello Penny.

PENNY JUNOR: Hello.

LL: You heard what Gina Yashere had to say there. What jumps out at you about how the media has covered Meghan and Harry?

PENNY JUNOR: Well it's been saturated here. We have had day after day after day. It was all very exciting to begin with and you know lovely real genuine love story I think. And nothing could be nicer and they chose Windsor to have the wedding in, which was sort of absolutely seen to be perfect for him. But I think we're actually we're suffering from overkill. I think our television screens seem to have had a royal, I mean a documentary about Harry and Meghan, Harry on his own, Harry meets Meghan. On every channel we've had. I think we've got the picture now. That is not to say that the country is not extremely excited and I slightly disagree with Gina. I think there are parties are going to happen all over the country. And I think that the majority of people are very very excited about it. It's good news. You know it's a nice event. It has, I'm afraid to say, in the last week though, it's been slightly hijacked by by Meghan's family. Your heart sort of bleeds for Meghan and for Harry really because I think that has really been handled very badly but it just makes her like the rest of us. We do, most of us, lurking in a cupboard somewhere is a relative that we don't particularly want to pop out of the cupboard just before our wedding day.

LL: Well then we have the news this morning as the story goes on that Prince Charles will now walk Meghan Markle down the aisle. What do you make of how the palace has handled this news about Meghan Markle's family?

PENNY JUNOR: Well I can't help wondering whether the palace have missed a trick here. Meghan's family are very normal people living very normal lives and she has now stepped into a totally totally abnormal life. And they have been drawn into it. It was as plain as the nose on your face that the paparazzi were going to be interested in her family. We saw this as soon as it became clear that Harry and Meghan were seeing one another and you know the press were camped outside her mother's house. They found the brother, half-brother, the half-sister. They dug up everybody that they possibly could because that's what the media does. And I think that this family was very very ill prepared for that and I can't help thinking as I say that that you know the palace could, or should, have extended some kind of help, either just in the form of advice. You know how to deal with paparazzi on your lawn, being followed by them. How to deal with all the offers of money to be interviewed. Because I think that ordinary people didn't really quite know what hit them when they get door stepped by the media.

LL: You heard Gina say - I'm assuming it was jokingly but maybe not - Her advice for Meghan was to get out. So what kind of world is Meghan entering?

PENNY JUNOR: Well I mean I do slightly agree with that. If not with much of what she said. But it is a very extraordinary life what Meghan is doing. She is giving up a career, she's giving up her privacy, she's giving up everything that she has taken for granted, that all of us take for granted every day; the ability to just you know decide what you’re going to do in the morning and go off and do it, not thinking about security not thinking about people with mobile phones and cameras. From now on she will not be alone. She will always have security with her. Her diary will become filled with engagements. Some of them will be interesting. Some of them will be boring as hell. She will have to be on parade at regular royal occasions the Trooping the Colour, the Cenotaph ceremony, the Commonwealth Day ceremony or I mean there are hundreds of these things throughout the year that she will have to attend with Harry. And then lobby the charitable works which I think she will enjoy. But again some of it is fantastic but some of it as a figurehead for charities some of it can be very tedious, constantly meeting new people.

LL: There is some hope though that a young bi racial American woman would make the royal family more relevant to a new generation. I am wondering what difference you think she'll make to the way the royal family is perceived.

PENNY JUNOR: Well I actually am delighted that an American bi racial person and a career woman as well. I mean she's very bright I think. I think it will make the royal family much more relevant to a lot more people in our society in Britain and probably around the world across the commonwealth. I don’t know about this black person or a half black mixed race person from centuries ago but certainly in modern times has not been a mixed race person in the royal family and the royal family I think at times has been in danger of looking a bit like some people sort of been done from another planet. But this I think makes them much more relevant. Do you know it was interesting the first engagement that she went on with Harry immediately after their engagement; they went to Nottingham the house there. It was noticeable that amongst the crowds were many more black faces than normal.

LL: Penny Junor, I hope you have your fascinator ready tomorrow morning and I hope you enjoy yourself at the wedding. Thank you very much.

PENNY JUNOR: Thank you very much.

LL: Bye bye. Penny Junor is a royal watcher and a royal biographer Harry Brother, Soldier, Son and the Dutchess the Untold Story are two of the books she has written. She joined us from Wiltshire UK. Well the CBC News is coming up next. Then as the lava flows on Hawaii’s big island, I am going to speak with a lava chaser. What a profession who is running toward a settlement taking some extraordinary images. I'm Laura Lynch in Vancouver and you were listening to the Friday edition of The Current. [Music: Theme]

Canada has dormant volcanoes. Climate change could wake them up

Guests: Glyn Williams-Jones, Liz Westby, Demian Barrios

LL: Hello I'm Laura Lynch in Vancouver and you're listening to the Friday edition of The Current.

[Music: Theme]

LL: Still to come: Imagine ice cream with no vanilla. Yes, vanilla may be the definition of a mainstay flavor. But the humble vanilla bean isn't so humble anymore. Its costs have been skyrocketing to the point that vanilla is trading like an exotic expensive spice and that's affecting everyone from ice cream makers to bakers and beyond. Coming up in our next half hour the story behind vanillas extraordinary rise. But first big trouble on the Big Island.

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: What's going to happen? What's going to happen with us? You know if we lose our farm we don't know where we're going to go.

VOICE 2: What I can do is pray and hope. You know and try to get all the information I can. It is very hard. We don't say we don't have televisions here. I'm going to go out try to get even a newspaper.

VOICE 3: Yes I knew I was building on an [unintelligible] zone, but this happens over thousands of years. So it was a gamble with time.

VOICE 4: I never thought this would happen to me. I thought this is just people on TV and in the newspaper, and one moment you're encouraged maybe the House will survive or we can go back and then the next year you're like no no, we're not going to make it.

LL: Hawaii's Big Island. It's a paradise to call home. But as those residents know all too well it's home, first and foremost to Kilauea one of the world's most active volcanoes. For the past two weeks there's been a slow motion emergency on the island as seems in the earth have opened with lava oozing out. Then yesterday at 4:00 in the morning local time Kilauea kicked into high gear with an explosive eruption sending ash nearly a kilometer into the air. As people in the volcano's path were packing up and heading for safer ground, Demian Barrios was doing just the opposite. He was heading toward the volcano. Demian Barrios is a lava chaser and photographer in Kurtistown Hawaii. And we've reached him there. Hello.

DEMIAN BARRIOS: Hi. Thanks for having me guys.

LL: How close have you been to these eruptions?

DEMIAN BARRIOS: You know I've actually gotten right up next to them, the fissures that have not been as violence have allowed us to get pretty close. Some of those fissures have continued to rumble and put out some flames. And so you know a lot of them have still been injecting lava. Obviously those pose a greater threat and we have not been able to get too close to those you know maybe a few hundred feet at most during the various fissures we had up to 20 of them. Several of them have had you know different stages of danger and some of them had allowed us to get pretty close to them.

LL: What do you see?

DEMIAN BARRIOS: We're definitely seeing a lot of things. The bigger fissures have huge fountains of lava that are being shot up into the air. Some of the more explosive ones are shooting up the large masses of lava and those are a little bit more intermittent. And then some of the smaller fissures or the fissures as they start to calm down will stop shooting out lava and a lot of times just keep putting out superheated gas and it almost looked like a fire breathing dragon.

LL: I was looking at some of the videos you were shooting and it wasn't just what you were seeing it's also a sound. What does it sound like?

DEMIAN BARRIOS: It's a very intense sound. Some of them have been putting out a lot of gas and a lot of pressure has been coming out and they make a sound that sounds like a jet engine, very very loud, very intense and shakes the ground. The louder explosions that have been being heard across the island just sound like a big boom. But the actual sound of the fissures that actually start being out the lava fountains have a very unique sound. It almost sounds like cake batter splattering on the floor except that it sounds like very heavy and very intense cake batter. So you have this jet engine sound. You have these explosions and then this constant splattering sound of the lava being shot out and landing on the ground around the cracks and the fissures.

LL: You go chasing after this kind of thing. So tell me how it feels for you to be there?

DEMIAN BARRIOS: It's a very overwhelming and humbling feeling. You can feel the reverberations in your chest. You can feel the ground shaking beneath you. And it definitely is a very humbling moment. It's also quite impressive. It makes me feel grounded. It makes me feel alive and it kind of just makes you be very very present.

LL: I bet, I mean really honestly, this is thrill seeking activity. This is danger.

DEMIAN BARRIOS: You know it is. But such as anything in life. You know I tell people one of the most dangerous things I do on a regular basis is drive my vehicle and you know just like the volcano, it's dangerous but you know once you get some practice with it you know you're able to operate around it in a safe way and still stay clear of immediate danger.

LL: Is there equipment that you use that actually helps protects you?

DEMIAN BARRIOS: Just basic equipment you know one of the main things that I carry with me is a respirator because the fumes can obviously be an immediate and a pretty intense threat. For some of these eruptions that we been having, we have been wearing helmets just in case any rocks are falling out of the sky.

LL: Demian why do you do this?

DEMIAN BARRIOS: You know that's a good question. I feel like I've just been attracted to that raw power for a long time. I've always been drawn to the powerful forces of nature and you know the same way how when you can stand there and watch a tornado or you know stand on the coast and watch huge wave come in during a storm. You know it's a very impressive thing. I have a lot of admiration and respect for nature and this volcano and lava in general you know being around that is pretty exciting. And you know having said that you know this particular eruption had a little bit of a tragic turn of events with all the homes that have been lost and people that have been displaced and evacuated. So you know it's unfortunate that we're suffering that type of trauma and loss here on the island. But nonetheless you know this very volcano as much as it is destructive; it is the same powerful force that you know with that magnificent created these islands. So it is a very mixed bag of emotions when it comes to that.

LL: I imagine so, but this interest that you've got in lava chasing does it go back to childhood for you?

DEMIAN BARRIOS: It does. Actually I have been very interested and passionate about volcanoes ever since I was a kid. I used to kind of have an obsession with drawing volcanoes and making model volcanoes and I always just imagine witnessing something like that. And you know lately I started to realize that in my adult life I have the ability and the privilege of being able to witness that and to be around them.

LL: I wonder what the difference is between you and me because I remember making a model when I was and I don't know Grade 3 or Grade 4 but I don't want to go after the lava. What makes it different for you?

DEMIAN BARRIOS: Well I've been around it so much that I've become accustomed to it. And I expanded my comfort zone. So I realize that there's a lot of situations where most people would be highly uncomfortable but you know because I've been around it so much I've almost become used to it so much that I almost crave it sometimes.

LL: Better you than me. You've taken some amazing images because you are a photographer. I'm wondering if there's one image that stays with you.

DEMIAN BARRIOS: For this specific eruption I have documentary type photos you know photos of streets getting covered photos of the jungle getting covered by the lava. And of course you know some houses and structures. So those are pretty compelling but you know my passion is for more of the the artistic side of the photos you know more long exposures and stuff like that. It involves a lot more time being there. And so it's a lot more intimate of a moment. And they definitely are engrained in my retina and in my memory for forever.

LL: Well Demian please take care of yourself when you head back out there again and thanks for telling us about it.

DEMIAN BARRIOS: Thanks for having me guys.

LL: Demian Barrios is a lava Chaser and the photographer we reached him in Hawaii. And you can see a couple of his photos on our Web site cbc.ca/thecurrent. Lava chasers aren't the only ones watching Kilauea with some excitement and erupting volcano offers a rare research opportunity for vulcanologists, the people who study volcanoes. Liz Westby is one such person. She's a geologist with the United States Geological Survey Cascades Volcano Observatory and she's been tracking every rumble in Hawaii. We've reached Liz Westby at her office in Vancouver Washington. Hello.

LIZ WETSBY: Good morning.

LL: What's Kilauea doing right now?

LIZ WETSBY: Kilauea, the updates for this morning is things are quieting down a little bit at the summits. Yesterday was quite the event that happened. As you were discussing earlier, there was a summit explosion around 415 in the morning that shot ash almost a kilometer up into the air. It was mainly ash and steam. There wasn't a lot of ash fall but there was a report from the local communities of trace amounts of ash falling. So that's one hazard that's going on. And then about 25 miles away from that you have the fissure system erupting down near that Leilani Estate subdivision. So we have one volcano and two hazards and actually this is stretching us pretty thin.

LL: Oh really well. I'm wondering if you can if you can explain in layman's terms. That explosion seem quite dramatic what was happening there?

LIZ WETSBY: What is happening - if you don't mind I'm going to go back a little bit in time to give you a little timeline as to how this all came about. So lava has actually been flowing from the Kilauea system since 1983. So it's been flowing out of the vent and up until this time it's really been a tourist attraction. So if you went to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park you could go down and you might be able to see the flowing lava. Last year at this time it was flowing into the ocean and there are spectacular images of the fire hose flow from last year and it's been flowing out onto the coastal plain but it's been limited to areas within the National Park. And so it's been very easy to go see it and it hasn't been such a hazard. But on April 30th and this is when it all started there was a large explosion at the pool vent the crater collapsed and a connection was established into the Lower East River zone and magma began making its way down into the Lower East rift zone, and that resulted in some of this fishermen activity going on down at Leilani estates. And because this whole system is connected much like you have a plumbing system in your home. The magmatic system is connected. And so at that time the lava in the lava lake up at the summit began dropping as well. And now that has dropped down to the point where this lava is no longer visible into the lava lake area and also groundwater is beginning to come into that. So it produces a lot of steam. You have groundwater you have hot rock. It produces steam and it can also produce these explosions. And so that's what we saw yesterday. We saw a lot of condensed steam jetting out. And then we also saw a little bit of ash as well.

LL: There was also a warning earlier this week about possible boulders the size of refrigerators coming flying out of the volcano which is terrifying. Is that accurate?

LIZ WETSBY: That is still a potential possibility. So you know there is this open crater now up at the summit of Kilauea. And as rock falls down into it because the edges of this conduit that used to hold the lava lake it's been eaten away, it's been heated, it's been cooked. It's fairly fragile. So as those sections fall down into, now this this event essentially then there is the possibility that they could impact the hot rock the magma that's down there in the heat and then the steam explosion could blow it back out. And so that's the potential, that's the reason that the park has been closed since May 11th.

LL: Good sense in that move. You mentioned Leilani Estates which is where people were living and has become subject to real concern. But it's not just lava it's not just boulders there's other health concerns as well. What are they?

LIZ WETSBY: Yes. The biggest health concern for the Leilani Estates area in addition to flowing lava is the gases. So there is gases in magma particularly sulphur dioxide or so too. And you can see those gases in pictures of the volcano. And so these gases, these fumes in this area of Leilani Estates and that can be a health hazard. So that can create breathing difficulties if you happen to have respiratory issues. You know it might aggravate that. So people elderly people or children that have these breathing issues can be impacted. So we recommend people do not go down there to not go and try and experience this because of the SO2 hazard in the area.

LL: So what are you going to be watching for in the coming days and weeks?

LIZ WETSBY: What we're going to be continuing to do is to monitor the fissure system so we have scientists from the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory they're down there 24/7 and they're mapping cracks as they emerge as potential fissures. They're also mapping the extent of the lava flow. There's one flow from fissure 17 that is now traveled oh about a mile and a half. And so they're tracking how far that goes. They're collecting samples because we want to know what is the composition of this. Where is it coming from. And they're also keeping track of the gases in the area with SO2 monitor so that we can warn officials like the Hawaii County Civil Defense Agency and the emergency management division, so they can be sure and expand the evacuation zone if need be or to issue all of these alerts to the public. So we're doing that. We also have gps equipment out so we can monitor whether or not the ground is inflating or deflating so we can maybe track where the magma is moving. And then back at the summit we're doing the very same thing. We have gas equipment out and so we're tracking what's going on at the crater. So we're finding that because the lava lake has drained out that actually the crater is collapsing in on itself a little bit. It's dropped about 60 centimeters since the lava lake has evacuated and so we are watching that situation because that has the potential to produce these explosive eruptions that would affect primarily aviation.

LL: Liz I wonder if we just get to address very briefly before I let you go. I want to bring a little closer to home. You work in the volcano observatory and that's the region that includes Vancouver-Washington where you are. And Vancouver-B.C. where I am. What are you looking at here? Just very briefly.

LIZ WETSBY: Well this is May 18th. So happy anniversary of the 18th 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens. So we are here on the ring of fire and this is a different tectonic setting but this is where we have subduction generating magmas that slowly work up toward the surface and produce these cone shaped volcanoes. They're kind of lumpy because we have thick magma. We have short fluid flows so we tend to produce a particular kind of volcano called the strato volcano. And so we have some of the same hazards as to why we have some that are a little bit more severe than Hawaii such as the potential for ash eruption. So we're here on the Cascades and it's a very different situation.

LL: All right Liz thank you very much.

LIZ WETSBY: Okay thank you.

LL: Liz Westby is a geologist with the United States Geological Survey Cascades Volcano Observatory. We reached her in her office in Vancouver Washington. Now here in Canada we do have dozens of our own volcanoes. And while most have not erupted in thousands of years, or maybe not at all, scientists are concerned that we need to prepare for that possibility because climate change could be increasing the chances of a volcanic eruption. Glyn Williams-Jones is a professor in the Department of Earth Sciences at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby BBC. He's also the co-director of the Center for Natural Hazards Research. He's with me here in Vancouver hello.

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: Hello.

LL: Now what volcanoes are you watching?

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: There's a couple that we're looking at. One that I think is particularly interesting is another one of our cascade volcanoes is called Mount Meager. So just northwest of Vancouver about 160 kilometers northwest or northwest of Pemberton. We've got this big monster volcano. It's about two million years old and it's being ticking along changing over that time. But we know that there's volcanic gas coming through the ice. In fact my team and I and colleagues from UBC have gone in there and made gas measurements. But the other thing that is interesting is this big ice Clyde volcano is also falling down. We have these huge landslides and it's the center of the largest landslides in Canadian history.

LL: Okay this sounds concerning to me and I understand that there was something happened in 2010 that was really significant.

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: That's right. The largest landslide in Canadian history came off Mt. meager in 2010. It was. The numbers are huge, fifty three million cubic meters a comparison the hopes slide which was originally thought to be the largest in Canadian history was 47 million cubic meters.

LL: And I remember seeing the aftermath of the whole slide. That's an enormous amount of rock and rubble coming down.

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: And you know it's not related to the volcano being active right now but it's part and parcel of the volcanic activity that's formed the system itself. It's a big rotten pile of rock rotten, rotten. And that rotten rock eventually fails.

LL: Well what would trigger the rock to the cause a landslide?

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: Gravity. It's always gravity pulling down on things. What can push it over the edge is things like changes in the amount of water in the poor space in between the fractures and the grains within the rock. And so if we start to change the flow of water, say due to climate change, as the glaciers are starting to recede we're starting to potentially see issues around that

LL: Changing dynamics. Okay you're saying as the ice melts in water seeps through the rock it makes it more unstable.

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: That and also the ice has for a long time been there holding up parts of the rock. So it's been buttressing the walls as that starts to recede. Now you've got less support available so we can start to see potentially a whole series of events.

LL: So what will climate change mean then for volcanoes around the world?

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: Each volcanoes is very very different. They've each got their own personality. So more broadly there are issues especially in countries like Iceland where we've got very big ice sheets and lots of volcanoes. If we start to take off the pressure from that big ice pack that can potentially start to change subtly the system, the pressure pushing down on the magma at depth. And we think actually 10,000 years ago the end of the last glaciation that there may have actually been more volcanism more active volcanoes because we were removing two or three kilometers ice. At Mount Meager it's a much much smaller system but really it's a whole sequence of events.

LL: Is the accepted wisdom among volcanologists that this is happening?

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: I wouldn't say accepted wisdom at all really. This is new work that is being done by some really top notch graduate students and it's pushing the paradigm trying to move to the next level of understanding for a given system. And can we stand back and look more broadly and look at that interconnection between changing climate, changing stability of the volcano. What's got us concern from Mount Meager is while we had this huge landslide in 2010, 53 million cubic meters, the one graduate student has been doing leading the work on this jeweler Betty has detected using satellite monitoring an area that's potentially five times that volume and it's moving.

LIZ WETSBY: An area of unstable rock.

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: Of unstable rock on the northwest side that is 300 million cubic meters. So if that were to fail in one event and that's just a you know hypothetical we maybe we could change the pressure, take the lid off the pressure cooker and we saw that in Mount St. Helens. The driving mechanism was different but we could start to maybe think about similar issues.

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: Okay you're scaring me. Immediate is the danger? Is there something we need to pay attention to?

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: It's something we need to pay attention to. I wouldn't say it's immediate but that area of Rock we know is moving. We had measurements leaked last summer at fluxes back and forth just because of the temperature but you know centimeters. And if you were moving that much rock over space's centimeters you know could it cascade, could become something more important. So that's why we are monitoring it with satellite imagery and things like this but our big Canadian volcanoes are really hard to study.

LL: You know I was born and raised here and I have never heard of Mount Meager until today and I'm wondering with its relative proximity to large populated areas what kind of preparation should be happening now?

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: Well already some of the work that is being done we're starting to make hazard maps trying to figure out if an event occurs. What areas will be impacted? Working with emergency management B.C., with the Squamish the lode regional district all of the municipalities who would be most affected. The fortunate thing that we have is our volcanoes are relatively remote from large population centers. So we can map out where a big landslide would go. We know it's probably going to go down, Pemberton Meadows things like that.

LL: You give me a lot to think about as we go forward here it's very interesting and as I said just a little bit scary. Thank you.

GLYN WILLIAMS-JONES: My pleasure. -Glyn Williams Jones is a professor in the physical volcanology group at Simon Fraser University. He's also the coordinator of the Center for Natural Hazards Research. He is here with me in Vancouver. Well coming up in our next half hour there is nothing boring about vanilla today. The story behind the once humble beans explosion in popularity and price what it might mean for the next time you feel like a vanilla shake. I'm Laura Lynch in Vancouver and you're listening to the Friday edition of The Current.

[Music: Theme]

Why the soaring cost of vanilla could put your favourite ice cream flavour off the menu

Guest: David Vanderwalde

LL: I'm Laura Lynch in Vancouver and you're listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

There are some times when I am in the mood for vanilla. I mean as a kid I used to like ice cream vanilla. It's like nostalgia to it. Yes I mean I loved the flavor in itself.

LL: ,Vanilla it sometimes gets a bad rap as a plain Jane flavor pale in comparison to chocolate or strawberry the very word vanilla has even become a synonym for the safe, boring, unsexy option but to those who love it vanilla is anything but. Vanilla is versatile. It works with everything from ice cream to baked goods to booze. It's flavor is rich and over the past few years it turns out the price of vanilla beans has been getting richer and richer as well. Vanilla costs have soared so much in fact that good old vanilla is now the second most expensive flavoring in the world. Only saffron costs more. And pound for pound vanilla is now worth more than silver. There's soaring prices forcing some businesses to re-evaluate whether they can afford to keep using vanilla. Our producer Michael O'Halloran stopped at Village ice cream in Calgary to speak with its owner Billy Friley.

SOUNDCLIP

While it's been high for a long time for the last three years it's three or four years it's been creeping up, but in 2012 when I started this business we are paying 50 dollars US a gallon and that was with a part dollar. So it was fifty dollars Canadian and now the quotes I'm getting around 550 U.S. dollars a gallon. And with shipping and the weak Canadian dollar that rounds up to about a hundred dollars Canadian.

What impact is that having on your business?

The margin for vanilla ice cream has gone way down. We tend to shy away from using vanilla to help flavor or other flavors. We look to make our seasonal flavors, flavors that don't require vanilla. When you think about flavors like stretchy Attell and cookie dough and lots of different flavors with a vanilla base you use vanilla for those. And so we've had to get more creative and look for other players because there's a lot of flavors that were vanilla would not be the right thing to enhance with. So yes. So it's it's been an interesting challenge for us.

VOICE 2: So what are you going to do. Are you going to remove it from the menu?

VOICE 1: If milk prices continue to increase then at some point we will have to remove it.

VOICE 2: Can you just use some extract, some artificial stuff in your ice-cream?

VOICE 1: With vanilla the artificial extract tastes a lot different. It's like almost its own flavor. If you think of like birthday cake made from dry mix from the grocery store has a very unique and distinct flavor that you can't really replicate with natural ingredients and part and a lot of that is the vanilla like artificial vanilla extract just has its own really interesting flavor. And you know and so I think people would notice and it just does not taste natural. I don't think we need to have a sophisticated palate to notice the difference. I think vanilla is one of those things where you notice a huge difference which is why people take having real vanilla extract in their pantry so seriously because you know you notice it in the baking and you notice it in ice cream.

LL: That was Village Ice Cream owner Billy Friley in Calgary. David Vanderwalde knows the business of vanilla beans inside and out. He imports vanilla from all over the world and especially from Madagascar where 80 percent of the world's vanilla crop is grown. David Vanderwalde is the director of Aust Hachmann in Montreal. And we have reached him there. Hello.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Good morning.

LL: That seems hard to believe that an ice cream shop of all places would drop vanilla from the menu. What do you think of that?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: It's a bit saddening but it's not surprising considering the cost of vanilla today.

LL: Why is ?it so high? Why is the price so high?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: It tends to be a cyclical type of product. We went through a similar price rise in 2002-2003. When you have one producing country Madagascar and things go wrong in Madagascar, well ultimately it affects the price of vanilla. In this particular case prices for vanilla were actually far too low from a sustainable point of view from about 2010 to about 2014-15. And when that happens production goes down. And of course the demand for vanilla has been rising every year steadily, quite a bit in the last two years, and eventually the demand exceeds the supply and prices start to rise. And vanilla is a crop that takes about three years to come to harvest from the moment you start planting it unlike other crops. So there's a bit of a lag which occurs and hence you have often speculation and rampant buying that takes place while the price is going up and brings us to where we are today.

LL: They say things go wrong. Is there something that went wrong in Madagascar?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Well actually a lot of things happened at the same time we had this. Like I said very low prices when prices on the ground were literally a tenth of what they are today and production started to go down. Production started to go down and other vanilla growing regions and overall global vanilla production was dropping. Demand was going up and then there was a big push, I believe it was by Unilever and Nestle, about three or four years ago to switch a lot of their artificial flavoring to natural. And that meant a spike in demand for vanilla. So we had a big increase in demand while production was falling. Last year there was a cyclone in Madagascar that went right into the vanilla region on the northeast coast, and although it didn't cause as much damage as originally expected it had a major impact on price. And I'd have to actually say today we are in a market which is showing signs of decline finally.

LL: It's starting to go down, isn't it?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: It's gone down slightly in Madagascar. I think we're back to pre cyclone prices but it's still historically very high. I mean the price of vanilla could fall by 50 per cent and we would still be at a historical very high level. But when it does start to fall it tends to fall fast as it did in 2004 when it went from about 500 U.S. dollars a kilo to 50 dollars a kilo and in the matter of about 12 months.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: You say precisely on prices but is demand dropping off at all?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Absolutely. Demand goes down. First of all at the retail level as we just heard from the gentleman I assume that was an ice cream parlor and there you see a big impact. Also vanilla which is sold in the bean form at retail has also impacted people just won't pay nine or ten dollars for vanilla bean when they used to pay three or four dollars for two vanilla beans. But this is really not the market that drives prices. What drives prices is the industrial market, the big industrial buyers who consume about 80 percent of the world's vanilla and it's really what they do that determines where prices going.

LL: You're seeing that then, the impact on them is that they're just not buying.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Well secondary products. They're trying to reformulate of course but there are some products and I'll give an example of super-premium ice creams such as Haagen-Dazs or Ben and Jerry's. If you go into the supermarket you can still find vanilla and these guys because they're you know they're multinationals with deep pockets they will absorb the extra cost and I don't believe a pint of vanilla Haagen-Dazs is any more expensive today than a pint of chocolate Haagen-Dazs. Even though you know despite the price of vanilla extract. They're really the ones that drive the market and when they decide to reformulate, and like I said there are secondary products which are already being reformulated, then you do .

LL: See a drop in demand secondary products. Give me some idea of what those are.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Well confectionary products that use vanilla, beverage products, second what they call category two ice creams which aren't necessarily at the same level of quality as a Haagen-Dazs or Ben and Jerry's but still supermarket brands private label. There are other products besides synthetic vanilla to consider out there. There's a natural Vanillin which is considered a natural flavor which does not come from vanilla beans which some manufacturers turn to, but from what I understand it doesn't work quite as well in ice cream which is really the number one. That's where you have the most usage of vanilla and dairy products particularly ice-cream, soy, yogurts and what have you.

LL: What are some of the less obvious things that have been them?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Vanilla is in a lot of things. Chocolate products all different types of confectionary products, Perfumes, alcoholic beverages. It's used in tobacco products. It's even used in cleaning compounds to soften the chemical smells when prices are more reasonable. It's really it is by far the most popular flavor and fragrance globally speaking.

LL: Okay give us a little lesson here where exactly does the Vanilla Bean come from?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: The vanilla bean actually there are two botanical types of vanilla Plantifolia Andrews which is the most common type Tahitensis and they're both the product of an orchid. It's a flowering vine that produces a flower that is open for one day of the year that immediately must be pollinated in order to give a green vanilla bean which will be harvested after six to eight months. And then after harvest there's another nine months of curing and drying and sweating and manipulation in order to get to the actual final product. It is the fruit of an orchid.

LL: And you mentioned before this is a three year cycle.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Minimum three years to get what they call cuttings. They make cuttings of the vines they plant them and after three years they will start to produce flowers. The first time the first year they produce flowers there's not so many. Optimum production is usually the fourth year and we are not we are now hitting the point where people who planted vanilla three or four years ago in Madagascar and other countries starting out to come to market.

LL: This sounds incredibly difficult. The whole process of getting it.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Yes it is. And Madagascar unfortunately because they are an extremely poor country they tend to dominate the trade because they, first of all they've been producing vanilla for almost 100 years, and it is very labor intensive and it's a very small scale farming over a very vast area in Madagascar. So other countries, when prices are very low, other countries have a difficult time competing with that.

LL: And what makes Madagascar the place?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: That's more historical has to do with the French who colonized Madagascar. Before Madagascar was the dominant supplier of vanilla used to be French Polynesia and French Polynesia grows to Tahitensis vanilla but that in those days have been had a very limited market. Vanilla in Madagascar actually comes from Mexico. Mexico is where vanilla originates it was the Aztecs who actually discovered vanilla. It was being pollinated by bees in Mexico and they brought vines over to Madagascar to grow. And they discovered there was actually a slave who discovered how to pollinate vanilla by hand and thus they created the industry in Madagascar. And Madagascar quickly grew the vanilla production particularly on the northeast coast. And they've been firmly entrenched as the dominant supplier ever since. Now their market share does vary from year to year but right now they are definitely the dominant supplier, which is not really good for the overall vanilla market.

LL: Now your company supports a non-governmental organisation in Madagascar called the GHA fund. They teach young people English about the environment and they help them move on to post-secondary school. Joy Moscovitch runs the fund in the Madagascar community of Antalaha and she is seeing the impact of the galloping vanilla prices on the families. Here's a clip of her.

SOUNDCLIP

.There are positive and negative impacts I think lack of education is worth the negative impacts lies. In other words people don't really know what to do with a lot of money here and if they're making a quick buck they tend to spend it as quick as they make it. Something the best that I can do with my English students, I think the best I can do is try and teach people about the importance of saving for the future, opening bank accounts, considering sending their children abroad to school. I guess my main vision on that is that vanilla makes you rich today but that can and it's not the end of Italy and change eventually. So thinking ahead in the business is definitely key to success and that definitely has got to be perfected amongst most locals, especially the rookie's are investing their newfound money in things that lose their value once they are purchased like motorcycles and cars. But on a positive note I've seen families living in raffia, straw homes building cyclone proof cement villas to owning multiple motorcycles, even four by fours, solar panels in the bush where people haven't had electricity ever. So that's sort of a positive spin and then you know you also have people who just don't know what to spend their money on, so they go to town, main town and they buy a refrigerator. They bring it back to the bush and they realize that the solar panels they have isn't strong enough to support the refrigerator, and they don't have electricity. So they just blew all that money on nothing.

LL: And that's Joy Moscovitch who runs the day h a fund an NGO in Madagascar. David Vanderwalde you go back and forth to Madagascar. What stories do you hear about the impact of that boom and bust volatility of vanilla prices on the people who work in the trade?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Well it's you know I agree with Joy completely. I've seen it already in 2000 to 2004 period. It's really all about education. We not only support joy but we are active and with another organization that are building primary schools just to get people the basic education they need to take control of their lives. If a farmer doesn't how to read or write and suddenly he's making 10 times or she's making ten times more money than they normally make they simply don't know what to do with it, as Joey said. So people always tend to assume that especially in underdeveloped countries that the farmers are being exploited and they don't get a fair share of the pie and what have you, but because vanilla is small scale and boutique farming through about 60 or 70,000 families they do actually benefit when the price goes up. But most of them don't really know how to utilize those resources to improve their lives long term. So we see that as simply a lack of basic education and that certainly is an area we focus on. As far as the social problems, well there definitely are social issues when the price of Amila per kilo is equivalent to about a year's salary. People in the bush are forced to do their transactions with cash and just carrying around that amount of cash, even for five or 10 kilos of vanilla, makes them vulnerable. There's a vigil anti-justice in the bushes, well in villages when they grow vanilla, when the vanilla is on the vines and it's about to mature, the biggest fear for any farmers that the beans are going to be stolen just before they can harvest. So if they do catch thieves - and there is a lot more thievery going on now than when prices are normal - they tend to take matters into their own hands and in many cases those thieves are actually killed on the spot. There's local kidnappings. You know the Madagascar people are incredibly friendly and not prone to this type of activity. But the amount of money involved in such a environment where such wretched poverty exists in some cases is just too much too much to bear.

LL: And we've got another clip of Joy Moscovitch talking about that about these high prices exacerbating security issues. Let's look let's just listen to her again.

SOUNDCLIP

A lot of things are hidden here. It's almost like a lawless country. It's a fly by night sort of situation. And that goes for a lot of things and Madagascar, especially out here in the bush where there is no real police and even if there is police then a little bit of baksheesh a little bit of money on the side always gets you by. If you're moving vanilla earlier than you're supposed to. People are benefiting whether they're the right people or whether it's people that should be benefiting. I can't say for sure. For sure farmers are making more money because they're being paid more for their product but then there's those are the farmers that are out bush where a collector has to go with his four by four to collect all of the vanilla from the farmers and then he brings it back and sells it to the big companies for this crazy price. So the collectors are doing really well.

LL: Now what does that mean for you? I mean you have a business there. Do you protect your workers on the ground or do you protect your supply chain? How do you handle it all?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Well we're careful about who we work with. We don't work directly with farmers we work with exporters. There's a whole network that's set up down there and there are many people who disagree with the way things are done. But you have to understand that Madagascar, this area of Madagascar is extremely rural. There's very little infrastructure. Many of the villages are accessible only by water, in some cases four by four. The average farmer is growing perhaps 30-40-50 kilos of green vanilla and takes about six kilos of green vanilla to make a kilo of cured vanilla. So they rely on the collectors to come around and collect their vanilla, and the collectors will put together a larger volume because they have more resources and bring it to the exporter.

LL: Everything that we've been talking about is so unexpected for me. When I think about a product like vanilla, really the vanilla is used as a word that is something boring synonym Vernet. So let's just talk about the actual vanilla itself. It does get a bad rep. People say it is a boring flavour and I'm betting you feel differently.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: It's not. It's by far the most complex flavour that I know of. I mean simply the fact that all the money and technology that's out there they still have not been able to replicate the natural flavour in a way that, like the gentleman said earlier, even the person that doesn't have the sophisticated palate can immediately detect when they're when they're tasting synthetic vanilla over natural vanilla. It gives a certain flavour that is never overpowering, very subtle, marries other flavors together like chocolate, especially high end chocolates. It takes the bitterness out of other flavors. So if I understand correctly there's over 300 identifiable compounds in vanilla. And even when you buy vanilla the consumer is used to seeing that one vanilla bean in a glass tube and the specialty stores. But in fact if you're buying Industrial vanilla there are dozens of different grades and qualities and techniques there's some qualities specific for the European market, some for the North American market, some for the Japanese market all those are cured differently and it is quite complicated. So no I don't see vanilla as being plain at all.

LL: Would you consider yourself a bit of a smellier when it comes to vanilla?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: I can tell the different. Smell is everything with vanilla and the immediate reaction I have when I see vanilla for the first time is to pick it up and smell it, to tell right away what type of vanilla I'm dealing with. Yes after 30 years in the business I guess I know I know but vanilla yes.

LL: So what's the best you ever tasted or smelled?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: I enjoy vanilla from well cured well grown vanilla in any origin is very interesting. Tahitian vanilla is a wonderful product totally different than Madagascar vanilla. When Madagascar vanilla is cured to its optimum quality it will actually give off crystals, vanillin crystals on the vanilla bean which tells you that it's really been grown and cured well. Consistently if I had to choose one of course that would be Madagascar. But recently we came into contact with a farm in Ecuador which started to produce vanilla, Tahitian vanilla, and vanilla was the most unique vanilla I'd ever seen and they only produced eight kilos but we're going to try to bring them into the mix. Because ideally you should have five or six countries producing vanilla in order to keep a competitive balance and not have these crazy price swings, because unfortunately we can't count on the government of Madagascar to take the reins and support their industry and protect it in a way that would prevent these type of global shortages and insane price swings.

LL: Again making that comparison to wine, if you're taking a Tahitian bean and growing it in Ecuador does it take different flavoring from the terroir, from the earth that it's growing out of?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Yes, there is Tahitensis Tensas vanilla which originates in French Polynesia and is very very expensive, even more expensive than Madagascar are today because French Polynesia has a much higher standard of living and they grow it a very - how do I say - Tahitian vanilla is grown specifically for the chefs and certain perfumery and that's about it. But there's a type of Tahitian vanilla grown in Papua New Guinea and that's a very interesting area for vanilla which has really come along in the last couple of years. And now Ecuador, and I notice that all three of these Tahitians, Tahitensis botanical species, each area has a different profile a different smell. The PNG vanilla has a bit more of a spicy note. Ecuador is kind of a spicy sweet note. The beans aren't quite as long. Yes it definitely has to do with the terroir. The bourbon the vanilla, the planifolia which is grown in Madagascar which came originally from Mexico. People who go to Mexico if they're lucky enough to actually see vanilla beans they'll notice they look the same but they have a different smell than Madagascar. It all has to do with the soil, the climate, the environment.

LL: What one vanilla product sends you into rapture?

DAVID VANDERWALDE: Personally I prefer to either work with the bean or I make my own extract. I take different vanilla beans that I have- And anybody can make their own extract just by mixing, chopping up a vanilla bean, let's say one vanilla bean per ounce of vodka. You want to have a relatively tasteless alcohol and I play with it all the time. So if I see well cured mature Madagascar vanilla beans with crystals on it I'm a very happy person. We actually had vanilla beans in a Peppermill at one time when the prices were more reasonable just to grind directly onto dessert tops but that became problematic when prices went up. And I'm always looking for new ways.

LL: It sounds like your kitchen smells great.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: As does my office.

LL: David Vennardwalde thank you very much.

DAVID VANDERWALDE: You're very very welcome.

LL: David Vanderwalde is the director at Montreal's Aust & Hachmann, a vanilla importing company. So what do you use the real deal vanilla or artificial vanilla flavoring? And can you tell the difference? We want to hear from you. Send us an email to thecurrent@cbc.ca, post on our Facebook page or tweet us @TheCurrentCBC or me @LauraLynchCBC. And here we're going to leave you with some advice from Sarah Lohman. She is the author of Eight :Flavors The Untold Story of American Cuisine.

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Taste and aromatic and flavor experience really comes from vanillin. You've gott one chemical vanillin that synthesized in artificial versus hundreds in a vanilla bean. Now both of these extracts, artificial and real vanilla, are useful in a bakers kitchen. Because even though the real vanilla has a much more complicated flavor experience to it, at high temperatures a lot of those hundreds of chemicals burn off. They disappear in high heat and you don't get that full flavor experience. What's left is mostly vanillin that primary flavor component. So when you were cooking something at high heat, let's say cookies, if you use real vanilla extract you're going to lose a lot of that flavor experience. It's better to use artificial vanilla extract because it's got that one chemical, vanillin, so, it is delivering a bigger flavour punch of the most important flavor component that survives at high temperatures. You are baking cookies, they get hot in the middle and you don't lose that flavor of pure vanilla. However if you're baking something at a much lower temperature, the other end of the spectrum is something like a custard that's just coming to a boil and then you're shutting it off - like you're going to make creme brule, or you are going to make ice cream - that's when you want to use really a vanilla bean because you can even still taste the alcohol that's included in vanilla extract in something like a custard. And since it's not reaching such a high heat you still have all of those beautiful flavor components to enjoy. And in the middle of the road are cakes. Cakes is really where you want to use your real vanilla extract. This kind of the perfect temperature where you both lose the alcohol flavor but maintain all those hundreds of flavor chemicals. So there is really a time and place for all forms of vanilla. And if you start substituting artificial vanilla in your cookies and even in some of your cakes you can save over 30 dollars a year, especially with the prices of real Vanilla sky rocketing.

LL: Okay you got all that your baking advice for the long weekend ahead. That was Sarah Lowman the author of Eight Flavors: The Untold Story of American Cuisine. That is our program for today. Stay tuned to Radio 1 for Q. Today they'll be checking out some of the artists nominated for the Indigenous Music Awards tonight in Winnipeg. And remember you can always take The Current with you to go on the CBC Radio app. It is free from the App Store or Google Play. Finally today this weekend's Royal Wedding is the kind of occasion that deserves an equally beautiful song to commemorate it. And after a performance by Coard and Tish this week it looks like Harry and Megan are still waiting for one. Court and Tish are characters performed by the comedians Will Ferrell and Molly Shannon they shared this musical tribute to the royal wedding on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. I'm Laura Lynch in Vancouver thank you for listening to the Friday edition of The Current.

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[Song by Cord and Tish, performed by Will Ferrel and Molly Shannon]

Full Episode Transcript for May 18, 2018

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