Zest for Cooking Enthusiasts

Sparkling Citrus Zest

Passionate cooks know the term "zest" is used to mean the outer, colored citrus peeling which has been minced or grated into a dish, adding an aromatic "spark" of flavor unlike any other. The essence of lemon, orange, lime, grapefruit, tangerine, or kumquat zest will delicately enhance the flavor of any dish, without overpowering others.

The act of "zesting" magically releases a concentrated aroma and tangy citrus taste onto your hands, cooking utensils, counter tops, and into your baked goods, salads, soups, and stews. When the peel from any citrus fruit is twisted, minced, or grated, there is a fine spray of deliciously tantalizing pungent oils, mixed with sweet juices, hiding dormant within the colorful citrus-fruit rinds.

Nature's Concentrated Extracts

Many cooks like to grow their own herbs and spices to create flavored cooking and baking oils, vinegars, and extracts, for continued or extended usage. However citrus zest can only be captured from fresh fruit peels for their potent zest appeal.

Colorful grated citrus rind can generally be dried, candied, or preserved for future cooking, baking, and homemade potpourri-scenting uses. But only the fresh fruit can offer the true zestful flavor sparkle and aroma called for in recipes requiring zest.

I soon realized that orange nut bread (with orange juice and zest) is much more delicious and flavorful, than a plain, ordinary nut bread. The orange (or other citrus) flavors give it a distinctive, zestful, almost sparkly taste in your mouth.

Sparkle Cookie Zest

This same citrus zest and sparkle flavor can be added to plain cookies such as shortbread, or sugar cookies. Surprisingly enough I discovered that the same zesty-zip and "sparkle" taste in many recipes can also come from adding baking soda.

I once ran out of baking soda while making oatmeal-walnut chocolate-chip cookies, and assuming there were enough flavors to hide a missing teaspoonful of the salty-powdered soda, I went ahead and made them anyway. To my disappointment these flavorful cookies (which I had always attributed to the dazzling chocolate chips) fell flat, devoid of the "sparkly" taste they always had before.

If your next recipe calls for orange or lemon zest (interchangeable with any fresh citrus fruit peel) or simply a teaspoonful of baking soda, be sure to include it. You could just be adding that missing ingredient, an extra special flavoring designed to add unexpected sparkle to your home-baked or home-cooked dishes.