Pralines

I was blessed with the opportunity to go to Belgium last fall to work with some professional chefs and chocolatiers. It was an amazing experience eof tasting, tempering, and learning new techniques when working with chocolates. One of our focuses was on learning to make pralines. During my first few days there. There was quite a bit of confusion over this word praline. Belgium uses a lot of French, especially in the southern parts. It turns out there are two words that sound very similar to my English my ears. The word praline (pronounced praa•leen) as we know it, means a hard chocolate shell with a soft center. The way we would refer to bonbon. And the word praliné (pronounced praa•lee•nay) refers to the caramelized nut and chocolate confection that we expect when we hear the word praline. After sorting out this linguistic confusion, I understood much more about what I was being taught. I had an amazing time with the chefs there and learned a lot of new techniques, including the making of these pralines. We hope you enjoy this classic combination of nuts and chocolate! Perhaps it will inspire you to share some stories of when language confusion led to new learning.