praline
Americannoun
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a French confection consisting of a caramel-covered almond or, sometimes, a hazelnut.
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a cookie-size confection made especially of butter, brown sugar, and pecans: developed in New Orleans in the early 19th century.
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a similar confection of nuts mixed or covered with chocolate, coconut, maple sugar or syrup, etc.
noun
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a confection of nuts with caramelized sugar, used in desserts and as a filling for chocolates
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Also called: sugared almond. a sweet consisting of an almond encased in sugar
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of praline
1715–25; < French; named after Marshall César du Plessis- Praslin (1598–1675), whose cook invented them
Explanation
Praline is a sweet candy made from pecans and a whole lot of sugar. A fudgy, cream-based kind of praline is especially popular in the southern part of the United States. Officially, praline can refer to any confection that combines nuts and sugar. The original pralines were made in 16th century France and named after the nobleman whose cook invented them, coating almonds with caramelized sugar. European pralines are also commonly ground up and used as a filling in cookies and cakes. French settlers in Louisiana swapped almonds for pecans and thickened their praline with cream, a confection that remains popular today.
Vocabulary lists containing praline
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Cake fillings of almond crunch and toasted pecan praline and candied lemon, while jackfruit and palm sugar bring distinct South-East Asian flavours.
From BBC ● Mar. 28, 2026
The mango passion fruit vanilla caramel plays so well with black sesame praline that you’ll wish you got a few, because one certainly isn’t enough.
From Salon ● Dec. 4, 2025
They include its wild rose vinegar -- priced at 235 kroner for 250 millilitres -- its pumpkin-seed praline spread and mushroom cooking sauce.
From Barron's ● Nov. 2, 2025
Those issues come to the fore on Red Cup Day, Serrano said, when customers clamor for holiday drinks, such as the apple crisp oat milk macchiato, chestnut praline latte and sugar cookie almond milk latte.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 17, 2022
There was not another praline for him to crunch, not even a gumdrop.
From L'Assommoir by Zola, Émile
The best pralines I have ever eaten were in New Orleans, from a shop near the French Market called Aunt Sally’s, a family-owned, women-led company that has been hand-pouring French Creole-style pralines since 1935.
From Salon ● Sep. 12, 2024
Odds are your state is “famous” for something, whether it’s honey, peaches, maple syrup or pralines.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 29, 2021
River Street Sweets pralines from Savannah, Georgia, and the salty-sweet, cheddar-caramel corn mix from Garrett Popcorn in Chicago.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 14, 2020
Some joined Masonic societies, worked fields, sold pralines, and hit jigs at the Cotton Club.
From Slate ● Feb. 28, 2020
She slices dessert—a chocolate skillet cake instead of Texas pralines.
From "Will’s Race for Home" by Jewell Parker Rhodes
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
