any tropical climbing orchid of the genus Vanilla, esp V. plonifolia, having spikes of large fragrant greenish-yellow flowers and long fleshy pods containing the seeds (beans)
2.
the pod or bean of certain of these plants, used to flavour food, etc
3.
a flavouring extract prepared from vanilla beans and used in cooking
adjective
4.
flavoured with or as if with vanilla
vanilla ice cream
5. slang
ordinary or conventional
a vanilla kind of guy
Word origin
C17: from New Latin, from Spanish vainilla pod, from vaina a sheath, from Latin vāgīna sheath