Small Sweet Things

Appears in
Paramount Desserts
Paramount Desserts

By Christine Manfield

Published 1998

  • About
Petits fours are small mouthfuls of edible luxury that end a meal and provide a final exhilaration for the palate. Perfectly crafted sweetmeats to enjoy with an espresso or a liqueur, their intention is to leave a final impression. Their miniature form requires patience and attention to detail, similar to the craft needed to make canapés. It is food that is born of pleasure, not necessity.

As Anne Willan describes in Great Cooks and Their Recipes - from Taillevent to Escoffier, petits fours derive their name from the small ovens that were built for the baking of what became ‘the name for an entire family of little cakes and cookies’. These were documented by François La Varenne towards the end of the seventeenth century in Le Pâtissier Français, the first comprehensive French work on pastry-making.