What's The Sitch With Dips?

As a food category, dips are universally well liked. Dips are entertaining, dips are pragmatic, dips are flavorful, dips can be the focal point of a bustling soiree. 

But, start asking questions about dips and you might find their simple outward appearance conceals a deeper, darker center. 

What is a dip?

In a classic square-rectangle situation, dips are a type of sauce, but not all sauces are dips. By definition, dips are a type of sauce that food is placed into, as opposed to non-dips, where the direction is reversed and sauce is instead applied to the food. 

In general, dips are on the viscous end of the sauce spectrum. A dip needs to cling to an edible vehicle from bowl all the way to mouth or else it will have failed its core responsibility. Alternatively, a non-dip sauce should easily flow and cover the dry grub waiting underneath. 

It also stands to reason that, in terms of intensity of flavor, most dips should avoid extremes. A dip consumer shouldn’t have to carefully measure as they plunge into a dip; the eater should be satisfied across a relatively wide range of dip amount. As an example, a habanero hot sauce is generally not placed in an unlabeled bowl for dipping because some eaters might take an ambitious first dip and have an unpleasant night.

To summarize thus far: dips are viscous sauces with accessible flavor profiles. Seems reasonable.

So why are they telling me what to do?! 

Dip. Dip? Dip!! What if I want to dunk? What if I want to submerge? If I dip bread in my soup, is it now a dip? It’s no longer a soup? Why am I taking instructions from an inanimate, salty, semi-solid?!

I’m annoyed enough at dips for just being the bossiest food category. Dip! Dip!! That’s already annoying enough. But to add insult to injury, these fucking dips don’t even give accurate instructions. If you are truly dipping into a good dip, you are doing it wrong. You should absolutely be scooping. 

While scooping does involve an initial entry dip, it is quickly followed by a rotational maneuver that collects material atop the chip (or celery stick or pretzel or whatever). This scooping maneuver greatly increases the sauce-to-edible-vehicle ratio and, importantly, gives the dip eater the opportunity to strike gold, to scoop up a real chunk. And the chunk is everything. 

Not all dips have chunks, but the ones that do are better. And that is the crux of this situation. 

It takes us back to what differentiates a dip from other sauces, it takes us back to viscosity. We aren’t pouring or squirting these sauces out of narrow bottles, we are taking scoops from them. This offers a unique culinary opportunity. 

Imagine your favorite guacamole; is it described as “industrial machine-whipped” or as “locally hand-mashed?” We all know guac needs to be handled gently in order to preserve chunkiness. Now, visualize reaching for a fresh tub of the best hummus at the local market… aren’t there a few whole garbanzos decorating the top? And I've always said, “If at least three out of these seven layers of bean dip aren’t chunkin', then I’m not dunkin’!” I’ve said that. Of course, flavor is paramount, but chunk is what elevates excellent dips above their mediocre counterparts. And in order to have a chance to score a real chunk, you can’t approach it with a wimpy dipping maneuver… true chunk can only be enjoyed with hefty scoops. 

To summarize thus far: dips are viscous sauces annoying for their bossiness, the best ones are chunky and, for the complete experience, eaters actually need to scoop. 

So how do we move forward with this information?

I don’t want to sow confusion. And the sweeping changes I’m proposing will take some getting used to. But, in the long run, there will be a lot more clarity for eaters and sauciers alike. Language matters.

The noun dip will be fully phased out in favor of scoop? and, yes, the question mark will be part of word. This punctuation implies that scoopable sauces are a tasty option, while avoiding the abrasive demands of the old system. Additionally, in order to qualify as a scoop? and print this designation onto the food label, a viscous sauce must pass a formal chunk exam conducted by an expert group within the FDA. Sauces that fail this test may be called dip-able sauces, but not scoop?s or dips. This is analogous to our current system for jams, jellies and fruit spreads; if your product doesn’t qualify as a true jam then you have to shamefully write “raspberry fruit spread” on the bottle. Champagne produced outside of France is just bubbly white wine, etc.; there are many precedents for this type of strict food categorization.  

In summary: the viscous sauces formerly known as dips are now to be considered scoop?s and, instead of continuing on as some vague and unregulated sauce varietal, there will now be a governing body that ensures quality and definitional consistency. Everybody wins. The chunk is everything.