Pièce montée

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A pièce montée (from French, literally "assembled piece" or "mounted piece," plural pièces montées) is a kind of decorative confectionary centerpiece in an architectural or sculptural form used for formal banquets and made of materials such as confectioner's paste, nougat, marzipan, and spun sugar. Although the ingredients were typically edible, their purpose was purely decorative and they were often not really meant to be consumed. They are associated with classical French chefs such as Carême. Carême had studied architecture and is credited with saying, referring to pièces montées, that architecture was the most noble of the arts and that pastry was the highest form of architecture.

Pièces montées for a banquet being prepared in the kitchen of Delmonico's Restaurant in New York in 1902.

The term pièce montée is sometimes used to refer to the dessert also known as croquembouche, an assemblage of cream puffs (or occasionally other kinds of candy or pastry) stuck together with caramel or spun sugar into a tall, usually conical shape. Unlike the type of pièce montée described above, it is meant to be eaten. It is traditionally served at parties celebrating weddings and baptisms in France.

[edit] References

Larousse Gastronomique (English translation), by Prosper Montagné, 1961 Crown Publishers, page 732.
Royal Sugar Sculpture Historic food website.

Illustration of a pièce montée representing a cactus, taken from Charles Ranhofer's 1894 book, The Epicurian. It was to be made of various types of nougat, including pistachio nougat to form the cactus itself.