Vanillin is widely used in cooking. It is mainly used to flavour sweet bakery products – classic snacks, creams, ice creams, syrups and spirits. Vanillin is also used to cover smells, like sourdough, which is often too strong.
Vanillin can be produced naturally or through industrial processing. Synthetic vanillin is
a synthetic aroma, i.e. a molecule obtained from the chemical processing of cellulose, while natural vanillin is extracted from the seed pods of Vanilla planifolia, an orchid native to Mexico.