“Follow Franco”- World Tour, 2011

World Cruise

The winter storm that recently hit the New York City, tri -state area, caused a reschedule in my departure to the Indian Ocean to join the “Silver Wind,” one of six beautiful ships in the Silversea’s fleet.

Flight details:

I can’t begin to tell you how excited I am to be going on this world tour, and now getting to spend some time on the Island of Madagascar to boot!

“As a chef , when one mentions Madagascar, I automatically think of vanilla beans.“Vanilla Beans” of Madagascar are cherished around the world as quite simply the very best. In my experiences as a chef…these beans are usually horded away and locked down in the chef’s office and rationed out…to the cooks in very controlled amounts because of the simple fact that these beans are extremely expensive.”

Madagascar-vanilla beans

To express how precious theses vanilla beans are to chef’s… I want to mention that I actually received a small package of Madagascar, vanilla beans, Christmas time from an Indian friend of mine…I used some in my holiday cooking and Yes!, Horded the rest… in my freezer. Wrapped well with plastic wrap and then again with tin-foil. This is a secrete for keeping vanilla beans for storage if not using them readily while still fresh. Freezing is a last resort option, but will at least keep them from going to waist and drying out, especially if they are not stored properly in their fresh state. They will freeze well up to 2 months, after that they loose their perfume and texture…Once frozen, let them defrost NATURALLY, then use them as per recipe. They will be fine.

So, Madagascar here I come !… the “Follow Franco” tour officially begins : February 4th, 2011

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Silversea’s fleet. | http://www.silversea.com/ships/silver-wind/

Vanilla Beans – http://www.vanillabeansguide.com/madagascar-vanilla-beans/madagascar-vanilla-beans