3,831 articles
Vegetarian restaurant
A vegetarian restaurant is a dining venue whose menu excludes meat and fish altogether, a format that grew from 19th-century food-reform movements and now includes vegan venues.
Velouté sauce
Velouté sauce: one of Escoffier's five French mother sauces, a light chicken, veal, or fish stock thickened with a blond roux; distinct from béchamel (milk-based) and parent of suprême, allemande, and bercy sauces.
Velveeta
Velveeta is an American processed cheese product, created in 1918 by Swiss immigrant Emil Frey from broken cheese and whey, sold to Kraft in 1927, and labeled by the FDA as a pasteurized recipe cheese product rather than cheese.
Vermicelli
Vermicelli, also known as Siwayan, is the name for very thin noodle or pasta strands, covering Italian wheat pasta, Asian rice vermicelli, and starch glass noodles.
Vermouth
Vermouth: aromatized fortified wine named for German Wermut (wormwood), first marketed by Carpano in Turin, 1786. Sweet (Italian, 90-130 g/l sugar) and dry (French, under 50 g/l) styles; 16-18% abv; key to Martinis, Manhattans, Negronis.
Vesper (cocktail)
Vesper (Vesper Martini): gin, vodka, and aperitif cocktail invented by Ian Fleming in Casino Royale (1953), named for Vesper Lynd; original recipe used Kina Lillet, now replaced by Lillet Blanc or Cocchi Americano.
Veuve Clicquot
Veuve Clicquot (Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin) is a Reims champagne house founded in 1772, run from 1805 by the widow Barbe-Nicole Clicquot Ponsardin, inventor of riddling; now an LVMH brand known for Yellow Label.
Vichyssoise
Vichyssoise (crème vichyssoise glacée) is a chilled puréed leek-and-potato cream soup, usually garnished with chives. Invented in New York by Ritz-Carlton chef Louis Diat around 1917 from his mother's hot soup; unlike hot potage Parmentier, and never popular in France.
Vienna sausage
Vienna sausage (Wiener Würstel): thin parboiled pork-and-beef sausage created in Vienna in 1805 by Frankfurt-trained butcher Johann Georg Lahner; also the American canned cocktail sausage sold since Libby's 1903.
Viennetta
Viennetta is a layered ice cream dessert created by Wall's (Kevin Hillman, 1981-1982) in Gloucester, with rippled ice cream and crisp chocolate layers formed on a variable-speed conveyor belt; sold internationally under Unilever Heartbrands, absent from the US lineup.
Vietnamese cuisine
Vietnamese cuisine (ẩm thực Việt Nam) is the rice- and herb-based cooking tradition of Vietnam, defined by fish sauce (nước mắm), five-taste balance, and three regional styles: northern, spicy central, and sweeter southern.
Vietnamese iced coffee
Vietnamese iced coffee, cà phê sữa đá, is dark-roast robusta dripped through a metal phin at about 1:5 onto sweetened condensed milk and served over ice; distinct from Thai iced coffee, which is cloth-steeped from a grain-blend powder and topped with evaporated milk.
Vijay Mallya
Vijay Mallya, born 1955, Indian businessman, former United Breweries Group chairman and founder of defunct Kingfisher Airlines; left India in 2016 owing banks over $1 billion, declared a fugitive economic offender in 2019, with Rs 14,131.6 crore in assets recovered.
Vikas Khanna (विकास खन्ना)
Vikas Khanna (विकास खन्ना), Amritsar-born Indian-American Michelin-starred chef of Junoon and Bungalow in New York, MasterChef India judge, filmmaker, Feed India founder, TIME100 2026 honoree.
Vimto
Vimto is a British fruit-flavoured soft drink created in 1908 in Manchester by John Noel Nichols as the herbal tonic Vimtonic, made from grape, blackcurrant and raspberry juices with 23 secret herbs and spices, sold in over 60 countries and especially popular during Ramadan.
Vin Mariani
Vin Mariani, also known as Mariani wine, was a French coca-infused tonic wine created by pharmacist Angelo Mariani in 1863 and marketed worldwide as a medicine.
Vin Santo
Vin Santo (Vinsanto), Italy's 'holy wine': a Tuscan passito dessert wine from dried Trebbiano and Malvasia grapes, aged three-plus years in sealed caratelli barrels; distinct from Greek Santorini Vinsanto.
Vinaigrette
Vinaigrette (French, from vinaigre, vinegar): an emulsion of oil and an acid, usually vinegar or citrus. Distinguished from creamy dressings by its oil-and-acid base; classic 3:1 ratio, mustard as common emulsifier.
Vindaloo
Vindaloo, also spelled vindalho, is a spicy Indian curry from Goa, adapted from the Portuguese dish carne de vinha d'alhos and traditionally made with pork.
Vinho Verde
Vinho Verde (green wine) is a Portuguese PDO/DOC from the demarcated northwest region established 18 September 1908, covering white, red, rosé, sparkling wines, spirits, and vinegar across nine subregions, certified by the CVRVV.
Vintage
Vintage (wine): the year grapes were harvested, printed on the label; also called millésime. Distinguished from non-vintage blends; governed by US 95%/85% rules and OIV's 85% standard.
Viognier
Viognier is an aromatic white wine grape from the northern Rhône, sole variety of the Condrieu AOC. Nearly extinct in 1965 (8 ha), it recovered to over 16,000 hectares worldwide; relative of Syrah via Mondeuse blanche.
Virgin boy egg
Virgin boy egg (童子蛋, tongzi dan) is a Dongyang, Zhejiang springtime dish of eggs boiled in the urine of boys under ten; listed as Dongyang municipal intangible cultural heritage in 2008, with disputed health claims.
Virtual water
Virtual water is the water consumed in producing a traded commodity, a term coined by J. A. Allan around 1993 and central to water-security debates.
Vitis labrusca
Vitis labrusca, the fox grape, is a North American grapevine native from southeastern Canada to the eastern USA, ancestor of Concord, Catawba, and Niagara; slipskin berries with foxy methyl anthranilate flavor and fungal disease resistance useful in breeding.
Vitis rotundifolia
Vitis rotundifolia, the muscadine grape (also Muscadinia rotundifolia, scuppernong), is a southeastern U.S. grapevine with 2n=40 chromosomes, thick-skinned bronze to purple berries, and resistance to Pierce's disease and phylloxera.
Vittal Mallya
Vittal Mallya (1924–1983), Telugu విఠల్ మాల్య, was an Indian entrepreneur who took over United Breweries in 1947 at age 22 and built a Rs 500 crore conglomerate in beer, spirits, foods, and pharma, later led by his son Vijay Mallya.
Vivian Howard
Vivian Howard, chef and TV personality from Deep Run, North Carolina, creator and star of PBS's A Chef's Life and Somewhere South, chef-owner of Chef & the Farmer in Kinston, and author of Deep Run Roots and This Will Make It Taste Good.
Vodka (водка)
Vodka (водка) is a neutral clear spirit of rectified agricultural ethanol and water, made from rye, wheat, or potatoes, with very low congener levels; origins disputed between Poland and Russia.
Vol-au-vent
Vol-au-vent: a French hollow puff-pastry case with raised walls and a lid, filled with sauce-bound savory mixtures such as chicken, mushrooms, or sweetbreads. Also called vidé or koninginnehapje in Belgium; its small individual form is the bouchée à la reine.