Word.ws English Dictionary

zest

/zɛst/

zest noun: the outer skin of a citrus fruit, used as a flavouring or garnish.

Noun

zest (countable and uncountable, plural zests)

  1. The outer skin of a citrus fruit, used as a flavouring or garnish.
    • The orange zest gives the strong flavor in this dish.
  2. General vibrance of flavour.
    • I add zest to the meat by rubbing it with a spice mixture before grilling.
    • He rolled his own cigarettes from a sack of Bull Durham, spilling flakes into his beer, which no doubt gained in zest thereby.1959, Peter De Vries, The Tents of Wickedness, Boston: Little, Brown & Co., The Treehouse, Chapter 7, page 92
    Synonyms:
    punch, spice, tang, zing
  3. (broadly) Enthusiasm; keen enjoyment; exciting and interesting; relish or gusto; a state of being zesty.
    • Auntie Mame had a real zest for life.
    • Almighty vanity! to thee they owe
      Their zest of pleasure, and their balm of woe.1728, Edward Young, Love of Fame, the Universal Passion, Satire II in The Works of the Reverend Edward Young, London: P. Brown, H. Hill & S. Payne, 1765, Volume I, p. 85
    Synonyms:
    gusto, relish
  4. (rare) The woody, thick skin enclosing the kernel of a walnut.
    • The green zest of walnuts was used by the women to shine their teeth and it also gave a beautiful rust colour to their lips.2006, N. J. Nusha, On the Edge (Short Stories), Lahore: Sang-e-Meel Publications, page 85
  5. (derogatory, slang) State of being a flamboyant or effeminate homosexual.

Verb

zest (third-person singular simple present zests, present participle zesting, simple past and past participle zested)

  1. To scrape the zest from a fruit.
  2. To make more zesty.
    • Strains ſo artleſs tho’ we proffer,
      Hearts o’er flowing zest the offer.1792, James Cobb, The Siege of Belgrade, a Comic Opera, in Three Acts, page 47

zest meaning in Tamil, Marathi, Urdu and Telugu

zest in Tamil

ஆர்வம, ஆர்வம்

zest in Marathi

enthusiasm
जोम jom

zest in Urdu

چسکا, چٹخارا, ان چھلکوں کا تیل, لطف, مزہ, نارنگی

zest in Telugu

zest, freshness
హుషారు huṣāru
More languagesFewer languages
zest in Malayalam
ഉത്സാഹം
zest in Kannada
ಹುರುಪು, ಉತ್ಸಾಹ, ಸಂಭ್ರಮ, ಆಸಕ್ತಿ

Examples of zest in a sentence

  • No one could give to the borscht such a sweet-and-sour zest as Bashele.1978, Isaac Bashevis Singer, translated by Joseph Singer et al., Shosha, New York: Fawcett Crest, Part One, Chapter Five, 1, p. 99:
  • She knew them all so intimately, and had such a peculiar, flamey zest in all their affairs, it was wonderful, if just a trifle humiliating to listen to her.1928, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, chapter 9, in Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Gutenberg edition, [Florence, Italy]: [ […] Tipografia Giuntina...
  • The singers, male and female, wore blue jeans and long hair and had more zest than talent.1962, James Baldwin, Another Country, New York: Dell, published 1963, Book Two, Chapter 2, p. 221:
  • Red wine is rich in life-extending antioxidants, and the caper will add zest even to a bad movie.2008 January–February, “70 Ways to Improve Every Day of the Week”, in Men's Health, volume 23, number 1, →ISSN, page 135:

All 32 example sentences with zest

Synonyms of zest

All synonyms of zest

Forms of zest

Noun
pluralzests
Verb
third-person singular presentzests
present participlezesting
past participlezested
pastzested

Origin of zest

Borrowed from French zeste.

Words formed from zest

Phrases with zest

Words that rhyme with zest

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about zest

What does zest mean?
Zest means the outer skin of a citrus fruit, used as a flavouring or garnish.
What is zest in Tamil?
Zest in Tamil is ஆர்வம, ஆர்வம். See Zest meaning in Tamil.
How do you use zest in a sentence?
No one could give to the borscht such a sweet-and-sour zest as Bashele.
What part of speech is zest?
Zest can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce zest?
Zest is pronounced /zɛst/.
What is the plural of zest?
The plural of zest is zests.

Words near zest in the dictionary

  1. Zerzanite
  2. Zerzanites
  3. Zerzans
  4. ZES
  5. Zeshan
  6. zest
  7. zest fest
  8. zest fests
  9. zestball
  10. zestballs
  11. zested

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: zest (page history and authors); zest (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); zest (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); హుషారు (Telugu) (page history and authors); zest (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); zest (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-zest.ogg.

Cite this entry: “zest.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/zest. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.