What does Avocado Sun-Dried Tomato Dip Taste Like?
Salty is one of the five main tastes. It has a satisfying and addictive quality with hints of sourness. Salty foods include cheeses, cured meats, chips, and olives. It is used in almost every dish and prepared food. Salt is added to enhance flavor and offer a distinctly salty taste.
Sour is one of the five main tastes. It is tart and bright, sometimes with a mouth-puckering quality. Sour is a naturally occurring flavor found in many foods, including citrus, vinegar, various dairy products, and certain fruits. Sour is used to enhance a dish or drink and is used as both a main and complimentary flavor.
Spicy is a flavor that brings heat and fire to food by creating a burning sensation in the mouth or sinuses. Spicy flavors come from hot peppers, horseradish, and wasabi. Spicy adds a kick and sometimes complexity to a dish and releases endorphins, creating a mildly addictive quality.
Ingredients
The cucumber is a vine-growing vegetable with a shiny, smooth green skin and a long round body. Cucumbers vary in size depending on when they were picked and the variety of the vegetable. They can be a few inches, or over a foot long and are wide like a zucchini. Though smooth, they skin may be ridged, or have sparse and tiny rough spots. The flesh is a pale white green with a soft yet firm and crunchy texture that is full of water. Seeds run down the middle of the cucumber. This vegetable has a refreshing and mildly green and watery taste. Cucumbers are best eaten raw.
Sun-dried tomatoes are dried exactly as their name implies. The sun evaporates the natural moisture out of the fruit, leaving a concentrated item with a full umami flavor. Sun-dried tomatoes are red, wrinkly and can be found either dried in a form that must be rehydrated, or they are packed in oil, often with additives to maintain freshness. Oil packed sun-dried tomatoes tend to have more flavor, due to the addition of salt and herbs. Either way, each form packs a delicious punch of full flavor to any savory dish and lends a slightly chewy, but very gently texture.
Lemon juice is made from the flesh of the pulpy yellow lemon fruit. The juice is squeezed from the flesh of the lemon and is a pale yellow color. The flavor is very sour and bright. Lemon juice is used in multiple cuisines around the world to brighten and enhance the flavors of the other ingredients. Lemon juice is used to make lemonade and goes well on fish. It has many uses.
Dill is an herb used in a variety of international cuisines. This plant is best fresh for its flavor is strongest then. Dill has frills growing off of the main stalk. The plant is green and aromatic. The flavor is grassy and bright with hints of anise, celery, and parsley. It works well as a garnish for specific dishes and is added to vegetables, grains, fish, and meat for flavor.
Greek yogurt is a dairy product made from milk fermented with healthy bacteria to thicken it into the product we know. With Greek yogurt and extra step is taken to strain all excess whey, creating a richer and creamier product. Greek yogurt is off white, or white in color and has a gentle tangy and milky flavor. The texture is thick and creamy without tasting very fatty. Greek yogurt can be eaten plain or incorporated as an ingredient into a dish.
The avocado grows on a tree and is extremely popular across many cuisines and cultures. It has an oval shape with a rounder bottom, and a bumpy, dark green and thick skin that is not consumed. The texture is soft and creamy when eaten. The flavor is mild, green and has a delicate flavor. Avocado is made into a dip and added to a vast variety of dishes.
Spinach is leafy green vegetable with thin stalks that grow in a cluster in the soil. Spinach has green, tender leaves that are oblong, but on the rounder side. Baby spinach has thin, tender leaves, while mature spinach has larger leaves that are still tender and bruise easily, but are a bit sturdier. The flavor is green and vegetal. It can leave a fuzzy mouthfeel from the oxalic acid that is found in spinach. Spinach can be eaten raw or cooked.
Extra virgin olive oil is an extremely popular cooking oil and used raw to drizzle onto a multitude of dishes or mixed into salad dressings. Olives are crushed in a mill and pressed to extract the oil. The color of extra-virgin olive oil is usually a golden-green. The flavor can be mild or sharp, though the sign of a good oil means a bite to the flavor and a spiciness.
Salt is a mineral composed mostly of sodium chloride. It is the main flavoring used in food and is naturally occurring in certain foods, such as cheese, beets, meat and celery, plus many others. Salt is white and has finer granules than sugar. Many commercial salts include iodide, while others exclude it. Most salts are white, while some are naturally pale pink with minerals. Salt brings out the flavor of something and can create a tangy mouthfeel, if used in excess.
Lemon zest is used in dishes to brighten the flavors and add a lemon flavor that is floral, citrusy, and anything but sour. Lemon zest comes from the yellow skin of the lemon. When using zest, none of the white pith underneath should be used, as it tastes bitter. The skin is shaved off in tiny pieces and this is what is called lemon zest, which also refers to the small size. The zest contains aromatic lemon oil and not juice. The small size of the zest makes it easy to incorporate into dishes such as pasta or into a cake batter.
Red chili flakes are usually made from cayenne peppers that have been dried and ground into small red flakes. The seeds are included and add much heat. The flavor is spicy and can be used as a topping for savory dishes such as pizza, meats and veggies.
