Common ingredient essential to toasty tropical tacos (5)
I believe the answer is:
aspic
'common ingredient' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both things that one consumes for nourishment as well as being singular nouns.
Perhaps you can see an association between them that I don't see?
'essential to toasty tropical tacos' is the wordplay.
'essential to' indicates the central letters.
'tropical tacos' becomes 'pic' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
The middle letters of 'toasty' are 'as'.
'as'+'pic'='ASPIC'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for aspic that I've seen before include "Lavender" , "Ending of Marlowe's thriller" , "Savoury relish" , "Jelly made with fish or meat stock" , "Savoury meat or fish jelly" .)