A canapé is a type of hors d’œuvre (“outside the (main) work”), a small, prepared and usually decorative food, held in the fingers and often eaten in one bite.
Contents
-
Name 1
-
Details 2
-
Vol-au-vent 3
-
Amuse-bouche 4
-
See also 5
-
References 6
-
External links 7
Name
The name comes from the French word for “couch”,[1] drawing on the analogy that the garnish sits atop the bread as people do a couch.[2]
Details
Wild salmon canape
Because they are often served during cocktail hours, it is often desired that a canapé be either salty or spicy, in order to encourage guests to drink more. A canapé may also be referred to as finger food, although not all finger foods are canapés. Crackers or small slices of bread or toast or puff pastry, cut into various shapes, serve as the base for savory butters or pastes, often topped with a “canopy” of savory foods as meat, cheese, fish, caviar, foie gras, purées or relish.
Traditionally, canapés are built on stale white bread (although other foods may be used as a base), cut in thin slices and then shaped with a cutter or knife. Shapes might include circles, rings, squares, strips or triangles. These pieces of bread are then prepared by deep frying, sautéing, or toasting. The foods are sometimes highly processed and decoratively applied (e.g., piped) to the base with a pastry bag. Decorative garnishes are then applied. The canapés are usually served on a canapé salver and eaten from small canapé plates. The technical composition of a canapé consists of a base (e.g., the bread or pancake), a spread, a main item, and a garnish. The spread is traditionally either a compound butter or a flavored cream cheese. Common garnishes can range from finely chopped vegetables, scallions, and herbs to caviar or truffle oil.
Vol-au-vent
A vol-au-vent (French pronunciation: , "blown by the wind") is a small, round canapé made of puff pastry.
Amuse-bouche
The French started offering canapés to their guests in the 18th century, and the English adopted the practice at the end of the following century. One modern version of the canapé is the amuse-bouche. Amuse-bouche literally means “mouth amuser”, but is translated more delicately as “palate pleaser”.
See also
References
-
^ James Beard, Hors d'Oeuvres and Canapés (William Morrow & Co., New York, 1943, 1963, 1985), p. xiii.
-
^
External links
-
Free Culinary School Podcast Episode 17 A podcast episode that talks about the canape's classical components, flavor structure and serving techniques.
This article was sourced from Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. World Heritage Encyclopedia content is assembled from numerous content providers, Open Access Publishing, and in compliance with The Fair Access to Science and Technology Research Act (FASTR), Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., Public Library of Science, The Encyclopedia of Life, Open Book Publishers (OBP), PubMed, U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, and USA.gov, which sources content from all federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial government publication portals (.gov, .mil, .edu). Funding for USA.gov and content contributors is made possible from the U.S. Congress, E-Government Act of 2002.
Crowd sourced content that is contributed to World Heritage Encyclopedia is peer reviewed and edited by our editorial staff to ensure quality scholarly research articles.
By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. World Heritage Encyclopedia™ is a registered trademark of the World Public Library Association, a non-profit organization.