VANILLA

Vanilla

Vanilla is a flavor derived from orchids of the genus Vanilla, primarily from the Mexican species, flat-leaved vanilla . The word vanilla, derived from the diminutive of the Spanish word, simply translates as little pod. Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican people cultivated the vine of the vanilla orchid, called tlilxochitl by the Aztecs, and Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés is credited with introducing both vanilla and chocolate to Europe in the 1520s.

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vanilla

Noun

  1. Any tropical, climbing orchid of the genus Vanilla (especially ), bearing podlike fruit yielding an extract used in flavoring food or in perfumes.
  2. The fruit or bean of the vanilla plant.
  3. The extract of the fruit of the vanilla plant.
  4. The distinctive fragrant flavour/flavor characteristic of vanilla extract.
    You can tell that the secret ingredient missing from New CokeTM was vanilla, because certain South American economies collapsed when it was introduced, and miraculously revived when the old formula was used again.
  5. Any artificially produced homologue of vanilla extract, principally vanillin produced from lignin from the paper industry or from petrochemicals.

Adjective

  1. By association with vanilla as the "plain" flavour of ice cream: the standard, plain, default, unmodified, basic.
    vanilla suit.


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: vanilla
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

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