- Daikon: Japanese long white radish.
- Danish: A rich, sweet, flaky yeast dough containing layers of rolled-in fat.
- Dariole: An oval-shaped mould used for baking and pastry.
- Dark soy sauce: A soy sauce often used for the colour it imparts. It’s less salty than light soy sauce.
- Dash: To add a tiny amount of an ingredient.
- Dashi: Japanese fish stock made from dried seaweed.
- Daube: A French braise of beef, mutton or lamb enriched with red wine and onions.
- Dauphinoise: Style of potato dish in which they’re thinly sliced and baked with cream, milk and sometimes cheese.
- Deci: Prefix in the metric system meaning “one-tenth.”
- Deep Fry: To cook food by submerging in hot oil.
- De-fat/ Degrease: To spoon or drain fat or grease from a soup, stock, sauce or gravy. Chilling the liquid first can make this easier.
- Defrost: To thaw food.
- Deglaze: To dissolve the thin glaze of juices and brown bits on the surface of a pan in which food has been fried, sautéed or roasted. To do this, add liquid and stir and scrape over high heat, thereby adding flavor to the liquid for use as a sauce.
- Degrease: To remove fat from the surface of stews, soups, or stock. Usually cooled in the refrigerator so that fat hardens and is easily removed.
- Degustation: A tasting or sampling menu, typically of several smaller courses.
- Demerara sugar: Light brown sugar with coarse crystals.
- Demiglaze: A rich brown sauce that has been reduced by half.
- Demitasse: Literally, “half cup.” Strong, black coffee served in small cups after dinner.
- Dengaku: Japanese style of cooking grilled skewered food with a sweet miso paste.
- Devil: To add a spicy ingredient, such as hot pepper sauce or mustard, to food, such as eggs, making deviled eggs.
- Dhal: Indian dish of cooked dehusked split pulses such as lentils seasoned with spices.
- Dice: To cut into 1/8 to ¼ -inch thick cubes.
- Digestif: French term for an after-dinner drink. Often strongly alcoholic (as in the case of Cognac or eau-de-vie), they are supposed to aid digestion. The Italian term is digestivo.
- Dijon mustard: French mustard with a smooth creamy consistency and a mild flavour made with brown mustard seeds, salt, spices and verjuice.
- Dilute: To reduce the strength of a mixture by adding liquid.
- Dim sum: Cantonese term denoting both a style of morning or midday meal (also known as yum cha) and the small dishes served at that meal to accompany tea. Steamed and fried dumplings, both sweet and sour, are among the best-known dim sum dishes.
- Dip: To slowly, but briefly, lower food into a melted mixture such as chocolate.
- Dissolve: To cause a dry substance to pass into solution in a liquid.
- Dolmades: Greek dish using vine leaves to wrap a filling of rice or meat and other vegetables.
- Doria: Garnished with cucumbers cooked in butter.
- Dot: To place or sprinkle small pieces of an ingredient, over top of food, such as butter, over a fruit filling on a pie.
- Drain: To pour liquid or fat from food through a strainer or colander, such as after cooking pasta.
- Drawn: With entrails removed.
- Dredge: To coat food with a dry ingredient, such as flour, bread crumbs or cornmeal before frying.
- Dress: To apply a salad dressing to a salad before serving. Can also mean to clean poultry or fish before cooking.
- Dried shrimp: These small sun-dried prawns are soaked in hot water or pounded to a paste before using. Available from Asian food stores.
- Drippings: The juices, fats, and browned bits that collect in the pan after meat or poultry has been roasted. Unless burned or very greasy, the drippings are valuable for a little sauce and for gravy.
- Drizzle: To slowly pour a thin liquid mixture over food, such as a cookie, a quick bread or to pour a thin stream of salad dressing or vinaigrette over a salad.
- Drop Batter: A batter that is too thick to pour but that will drop from a spoon in lumps.
- Drop: To place cookies by spoonfuls onto a cookie sheet. Also, can mean a small amount of liquid, such as food coloring.
- Dry Heat: To cook by roasting, broiling or grilling.
- Dry-heat Cooking Methods: Methods in which heat is conducted to foods without the use of moisture.
- Dubarry: Garnished with or containing cauliflower.
- Duchesse Potatoes (doo-shess): Potato puree mixed with butter and egg yolks.
- Dumpling: Any of a variety of small starch products made from soft doughs or batter and cooked by simmering or steaming.
- Dust: To coat lightly with an ingredient, such as flour or powdered sugar.
- Duxelles: A coarse paste made from finely chopped mushrooms sautéed with shallots in butter.