25 Oct /16

Praline

Praline - Word of the day - EVS Translations
Praline – Word of the day – EVS Translations

These days, it seems like people have a difficult time agreeing on anything, but there is at least one thing that everyone likes: candy. Think about it: have you ever met anyone who does not like candy? Though we all like it, how much do we really know about it? Today, let’s look at one of the favourite European treats, the praline.

The word praline, according to legend, comes from the name of the man whose cook initially created the sugared sweetmeat in the early 1700s, the Marshal du Plessis-Praslin (pronounced “praline”).

Not long after the advent of the confection itself in France, the word was first recorded in the 1714 English cookbook, A Collection of above Three Hundred Receipts in Cookery, by Mary Kettilby.

A little over a decade later, in Richard Bradley’s 1727 The Family Dictionary we get the fist understanding of the original dish: “Almonds fried, or Pralines, a Dish prepared by taking a Pound of the best Jordan Almonds,..boil them to a Candy [in a syrup of loaf-sugar], constantly stirring till they are dry.”

Initially consisting solely of just nuts and sugar, the modern definition of what the word actually means really depends on your location. While the classic iteration is still enjoyed in France, the concept of grinding down the nuts in order to produce a powder has given us praline cakes, ice creams, and, when combined with chocolate to form a paste, it forms the core of the chocolate praline. Belgian confectioners, preferring a more smooth and liquid filling for their pralines, will often add cream or milk to the nut and sugar mixture to create the centre of their pralines. Finally, in the Southern United States, where sugar was more easily accessible, the praline loses the chocolate coating and, when mixed with butter and cream and cooked slowly in an open kettle, forms almost a fudge-like consistency.

Honestly, when you are discussing a combination of nuts, sugar, and chocolate or cream, there really isn’t a wrong way to prepare or eat a praline- unless you run out of them too quickly.