vanilla

nounadjectivecommon in dialogue

//vəˈnɪl.ə//
//vəˈnɛl.ə//

Any tropical climbing orchid of the genus Vanilla (especially Vanilla planifolia), bearing podlike fruit yielding an extract used in flavoring food or in perfumes.

noun

1
Any tropical climbing orchid of the genus Vanilla (especially Vanilla planifolia), bearing podlike fruit yielding an extract used in flavoring food or in perfumes.
Vanilla itself was transplanted from Madagascar, the main source of the spice, to Polynesia a century ago.
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.
5
Any artificially produced homologue of vanilla extract, principally vanillin produced from lignin from the paper industry or from petrochemicals.
6
slangSomeone who is not into fetishism.
7
slangAn unmodded version of a game.
8
A yellowish-white colour, like that of vanilla ice cream.
9
A white person.

Etymology

Etymology tree Proto-Italic *wāgīnā Latin vāgīna Old Spanish vayna Spanish vaina Proto-Indo-European *-lós Proto-Indo-European *-elós Proto-Italic *-elos Latin -lus Latin -ellus Latin -ella Old Spanish -iella Spanish -illa Spanish vainillabor. English vanilla Borrowed from Spanish vainilla, a diminutive form of vaina (“pod”). "Plain" senses derive from the perceived plainness of vanilla ice cream.

adjective

1
Of vanilla.
A mass of folders and binders. One, vanilla in colour, catches her eye.
2
Standard, plain, default, unmodified, basic.
vanilla JavaScript
BBCFiles is a BBC file converter that converts between some of the various types of files used by BBC emulators on Acorn & PC formats. It supports 6502Em style applications & scripts, /ssd dfs disc images (supporting watford double catalogue), vanilla directories, /zip of bbc files with /inf files (with limitations) and directory of bbc files with /inf files.
3
Not kinky, not involving BDSM.
An uncharacteristically vanilla threesome and non-cute realist rendering - derived paradoxically from tracing drawings rather than photographs.
While Dominick was more of a vanilla kind of a guy himself, he wasn't a total dunce when it came to the kinkier sides of things.
Sebastian could never do that, be in a marriage with a vanilla woman.
4
Plain; conventional; unimaginative.
a vanilla rendition of the concerto
The further right or left you go, the more likely you are to eventually come around to hating Jews. On the left, this is plain to see. From the Corbyn-era trend to attack Israel for all the world's sins, to the self-hating asaJews that tweeted enthusiastically about October 7 being a 'day of celebration' to previously vanilla comedian Reginald Hunter retweeting posts about the evils of the Talmud.

Forms

plural: vanillas
comparative: more vanilla
superlative: most vanilla

vandalism · Willful damage to or destruction of any property, such as…vanessa · Any butterfly of the genus Vanessa.Vanessa · A female given name originating as a coinage.

vanilla · Any tropical climbing orchid of the genus Vanilla (especially Vanilla planifolia), bearing podlike fruit yielding an extract used in flavoring food…

vanish · To become invisible or to move out of view unnoticed.vanished · No longer apparent; not extant; gone.vanishing · That vanishes.

The neighbouring pages — Alphabetical order follows the rules of the language, not byte values: an accent decides only between two otherwise identical words, and Spanish files Ñ as a letter of its own.