zesty
Americanadjective
-
full of zest; piquant.
a zesty salad dressing.
-
energetic; active.
zesty trading in growth stocks.
Etymology
Origin of zesty
Explanation
Something that's zesty is fun and exciting. The zesty crowd that attends your party is lively, enthusiastic, and maybe even a little bit loud. People and parties can both be described as zesty, but you can also talk specifically about food that tastes zesty. When you eat a zesty lunch, it's highly flavored or even spicy. If you give her the extra hot salsa, your mom might say, "Ooh, these enchiladas are zesty!" The adjective comes from zest, the word for the outer part of an orange or lemon peel, which is often added to recipes for extra flavor.
Vocabulary lists containing zesty
Tasteful Terms: Flavorful Words
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Words to Describe Food
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Florida's B.E.S.T. Common Suffixes: -y
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
It all sets up for what is suddenly a zesty Game 4 on Wednesday.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 9, 2026
With its zesty appreciation for the city’s landscape of oddballs, menacing and disarming alike, “Tuner” has some similarity to one of last year’s best pictures, “Caught Stealing.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 21, 2026
This zesty country-pop flirtation was composed, per “In My Lifetime’s” notes, “in the back of a limo as we approached the outskirts of Paducah, Kentucky.”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 6, 2026
Even the brighter dishes — the lemony pasta, the zesty black bean salad — are about steadiness as much as sparkle: reliable, make-ahead, happy to wait for you.
From Salon ● Dec. 18, 2025
He makes me the most zesty yet subtle macaroni and cheese I’ve ever had.
From "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel
Yotam Ottolenghi literally turned the concept of a pineapple upside-down cake on its head by making a zesty batter and an even zestier lemon-maple butter t drizzled over the entire cake while it's still warm.
From Salon ● Mar. 16, 2022
If you like the dried oregano and other spices common to jarred pizza sauce, add it to the crushed tomatoes for a zestier sauce.
From Washington Times ● Feb. 16, 2021
Zoom in on just the front right panel, where sriracha obscures a bottle of ketchup, prepared horseradish is easier to reach than mayonnaise and zestier mustards outnumber light ones.
From Washington Post ● Sep. 4, 2020
No answers from me, yet, except to say that these new recordings, taken live from London’s Cadogan Hall in 2013, feel conceived on a zestier, more astringent, frankly smaller scale than the first.
From New York Times ● Jan. 14, 2015
She is zestier than an unwaxed citrus fruit and has a get-on-and-do-it attitude that makes her hilariously formidable company.
From The Guardian ● Jul. 19, 2014
The work of the sculptor Rachel Harrison is both the zestiest and the least digestible in contemporary art.
From The New Yorker ● Dec. 15, 2014
For admirers of Chase’s achievement in turning The Sopranos into one of the zestiest, most impressive TV epics, is likely to be a big disappointment.
From Time ● Oct. 5, 2012
Of all Shakespeare’s plays, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” has the zestiest dance sensibility, with its fairy roundels from English folklore and the jaunty, singing rhythm of its poetry.
From Washington Post
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
