This is how I'd decide what the answer is:
1. Something with very little taste, esp. in smaller amounts, like dried parsley.
2. Sometimes I think chopped nuts would be another example in recipes like brownies due to personal taste or due to Allergies or maybe the type of nuts used (I like pecans better than walnuts, for example and my mom prefers dried currents over raisins in baked goods). But not if it's a recipe for Nut Loaf or something like that.
3. Or something added in to a particular recipe version to give it an signature, ethnic, or texture "twist" like water chestnuts in turkey stuffing.
When I'm cooking and missing an ingredient or know it will be disliked with a certain ingredient, I pick and choose some ingredients based on preference, availability, or more benign flavor or texture, like dried parsely. But a chef might toss me out of the kitchen for that. Essential ingredients, to me, are the ones that you need to make it taste right, have the right texture, or cause the right chemical reactions needed to create the finished product. Leaving out things like eggs, milk, butter/fat, flour, baking powder, soda, or even cream of tarter (or its baking soda & powder equivalent) is a bad idea. If you're making something you don't eat or haven't tried before, sticking to the recipe is more important--I think. I don't eat blackened chicken, but my ex husband does, and after several different recipes and my own modifications based on how it smelled and lookef at his favorite restaurant and what he told me it tasted like to him, I finally got it right according to what his grandma made and how he likex it. So now I don't alter my spice mixture amounts at all. I can't taste it because it's way too spicy-hit for me. So I have to think of each ingredient and its amount as being essential.
I might have the wrong answer here, but it's based on a lot of goof ups in the kitchen and many preference and successful copycat attempts like trying to recreate 'grandma's spice cookie/honig kuchen' (still don't have it exactly right) or the 'knodel I had in Austria in like, 1972'.
(Sorry it's so long. iPod typing in boxes is hard to gauge length for me--I don't know how to scroll up.)
Yes, water is an ingredient in the recipe.
Each addition of various types of foods in a dish is called an ingredient. The list of foods that make up a recipe is called an ingredient. For example, chicken noodle soup will have chicken as an ingredient, noodles as an ingredient, and other ingredients.
In a cake recipe, for example, "sugar divided" means that different amounts of the ingredient will be used for different parts of the recipe, although you will measure the entire amount when beginning the recipe.
Modification of a recipe means you have modified (made a change to) the recipe. It could be you add an ingredient not listed in the recipe, or even change the amount of an ingredient. It could also be you changed the temperature and time of cooking the recipe.
To divide a recipe for a smaller portion, you can simply reduce the quantities of all the ingredients proportionally. For example, if you want to make half the recipe, use half of each ingredient listed.
The most important ingredient for a chicken soup recipe can vary based on the individual making it. Although, arguably the most important ingredient would be chicken. Another very important ingredient would be the broth or water included in the recipe.
salt
A delicious sauce recipe that includes tomato paste as a key ingredient is marinara sauce.
The main ingredient of Spanish stew will depend on the recipe. There is more than one kind.Depending on the recipe, the main ingredient is either chicken, beef, chorizo, beans (vegetarian) and potato (vegetarian). it also has a mix of vegetables, again, based on the exact recipe.
In baking, "ea" usually refers to "each," indicating the quantity of a particular ingredient to be used in a recipe. For example, a recipe might call for "2 ea eggs," meaning to use 2 eggs.
A nonessential phrase is a phrase in a sentence that doesn't need to be there. For example; The boy, who just ate dinner, wrote that story. No one needs to know that the boy just ate dinner. Who just ate dinner is a nonessential phrase.
When the ratio of 1 part of ingredient 3 to 1 part of ingredient 2 is used in a recipe, it is the same as using 1 cup of ingredient 3 to 1 cup of ingredient 2. The ratio and the cup measurements are equivalent in this case.