Dessert () is a
course that concludes a meal. The course consists of sweet foods, such as
confections, and possibly a beverage such as
dessert wine and
liqueur. In some parts of the world, such as much of central and western
Africa, and most parts of
China and
India, there is no tradition of a dessert course to conclude a meal.
The term ''dessert'' can apply to many
confections, such as
biscuits,
cakes,
cookies,
custards,
gelatins,
ice creams,
pastries,
pies,
puddings,
sweet soups,
tarts and
fruit salad.
Fruit is also commonly found in dessert courses because of its naturally occurring sweetness. Some cultures sweeten foods that are more commonly
savory to create desserts.
Etymology
The word "dessert" originated from the French word ''desservir,'' meaning "to clear the table."
Its first known use was in 1600, in a health education manual entitled ''Naturall and artificial Directions for Health'', written by
William Vaughan.
In his ''A History of Dessert'' (2013), Michael Krondl explains that it refers to the fact that dessert was served after the table had been cleared of other dishes.
The term dates from the 14th century but attained its current meaning around the beginning of the 20th century, when "
service à la française" (setting a variety of dishes on the table at the same time) was replaced with "
service à la russe" (presenting a meal in courses).
Other names
The word "dessert" is most commonly used for this course in
Australia,
Canada,
Ireland,
New Zealand, and the
United States, while it is one of several synonyms (including "''
pudding''", "''sweet''" and "''afters''") in the
United Kingdom and some other Commonwealth countries.
History
thumb|250px|Some [[Sweets of the Indian subcontinent|Indian confectionery desserts from hundreds of varieties. In certain parts of India, these are called ''mithai'' or sweets. Sugar and desserts have a long history in India: by about 500 BC, people in India had developed the technology to produce sugar crystals. In the local language, these crystals were called ''khanda'' (खण्ड), which is the source of the word ''candy''.]]
Sweets were fed to the gods in ancient Mesopotamia
and [[ancient India]]
and other ancient civilizations. Dried fruit and honey were probably the first sweeteners used in most of the world, but the spread of
sugarcane around the world was essential to the development of dessert.
Sugarcane was grown and refined in India before 500 BC
and was crystallized, making it easy to transport, by AD 500. Sugar and sugarcane were traded, making sugar available to Macedonia by 300 BC and China by AD 600. In the
Indian subcontinent, the Middle East, and China, sugar has been a staple of cooking and desserts for over a thousand years. Sugarcane and sugar were little known and rare in Europe until the twelfth century or later when the
Crusades and then
colonization spread its use.
Herodotus mentions that, as opposed to the
Greeks, the main
Persian meal was simple, but they would eat many desserts afterwards.
Europeans began to manufacture
sugar in the
Middle Ages, and more sweet desserts became available. Even then sugar was so expensive usually only the wealthy could indulge on special occasions. The first
apple pie recipe was published in 1381. The earliest documentation of the term ''cupcake'' was in "Seventy-five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats" in 1828 in
Eliza Leslie's ''Receipts''
cookbook.
The
Industrial Revolution in Europe and later America caused desserts (and food in general) to be mass-produced, processed, preserved, canned, and packaged. Frozen foods, including desserts, became very popular starting in the 1920s when freezing emerged. These processed foods became a large part of diets in many industrialized nations. Many countries have desserts and foods distinctive to their nations or region.
Ingredients
Sweet desserts usually contain cane sugar, palm sugar, brown sugar, honey, or some types of syrup such as molasses, maple syrup, treacle, or corn syrup. Other common ingredients in Western-style desserts are flour or other starches, Cooking
fats such as butter or lard, dairy,
eggs, salt, acidic ingredients such as lemon juice, and spices and other flavoring agents such as chocolate, peanut butter, fruits, and
nuts. The proportions of these ingredients, along with the preparation methods, play a major part in the consistency, texture, and flavor of the end product.
Sugars contribute moisture and tenderness to baked goods. Flour or starch components serves as a protein and gives the dessert structure. Fats contribute moisture and can enable the development of flaky layers in pastries and pie crusts. The dairy products in baked goods keep the desserts moist. Many desserts also contain eggs, in order to form custard or to aid in the rising and thickening of a cake-like substance. Egg yolks specifically contribute to the richness of desserts. Egg whites can act as a leavening agent
or provide structure. Further innovation in the healthy eating movement has led to more information being available about vegan and gluten-free substitutes for the standard ingredients, as well as replacements for refined sugar.
Desserts can contain many spices and extracts to add a variety of flavors. Salt and acids are added to desserts to balance sweet flavors and create a contrast in flavors. Some desserts are
coffee-flavored, for example an iced coffee
soufflé or coffee biscuits. Alcohol can also be used as an ingredient, to make alcoholic desserts.
Varieties & elements
Dessert consist of variations of tasted, textures, and appearances. Desserts can be defined as a usually sweeter course that concludes a meal.
This definition includes a range of courses ranging from fruits or dried nuts to multi-ingredient cakes and pies. Many cultures have different variations of dessert. In modern times the variations of desserts have usually been passed down or come from geographical regions. This is one cause for the variation of desserts. These are some major categories in which desserts can be placed.
Cakes

Cakes are sweet tender breads made with sugar and delicate flour. Cakes can vary from light, airy sponge cakes to dense cakes with less flour. Common flavorings include
dried,
candied or fresh
fruit,
nuts,
cocoa or
extracts. They may be filled with
fruit preserves or
dessert sauces (like
pastry cream), iced with
buttercream or other icings, and decorated with
marzipan, piped borders, or candied fruit. Cake is often served as a celebratory dish on ceremonial occasions, for example
weddings,
anniversaries, and
birthdays. Small-sized cakes have become popular, in the form of
cupcakes and
petits fours.
Puddings
Puddings are thickened with starches such as
corn starch or
tapioca.
Small cakes & pastries
A batched dough between a cake and pastry by the mix of ingredients. An Old French ''bescuit'', commonly spelt in English as biscuit, is a derivation of Latin for ''twice-baked''.
[See, for example, Shakespeare's use of "Twice-sod simplicity! ''Bis coctus!''" in ''Love's Labour's Lost''. ()] A Dutch ''koekje'', commonly spelt in English as cookie, is a derivation of ''cake-ie '', meaning little cake.
This form of dough can have a texture that is crisp, hard, chewy, or soft – in the UK a biscuit is the former two and a cookie is typically the latter. Examples include a
ginger nut,
shortbread biscuit and
chocolate chip cookie.
Other small cakes and pastries can also be counted as under these terms, due to their size and relative similarity to cookies and biscuits, such as
jaffa cakes and
Eccles cakes.
Confection
Confection, also called
candy, sweets or lollies, features
sugar or
honey as a principal ingredient.
Many involve sugar heated into crystals with subtle differences. Dairy and sugar based include
caramel,
fudge and
toffee or
taffy. They are multiple forms of egg and sugar
meringues. and similar confections. Unheated sugar co-adulate into icings, preservatives and sauces with other ingredients.
Chocolate
''
Theobroma cacao beans'' can be a substitute or more commonly mixed with sugar to form chocolate is Pure, unsweetened dark chocolate contains primarily cocoa solids. Cocoa butter is also added in varying proportions. Much of the chocolate currently consumed is in the form of sweet chocolate, combining chocolate with sugar. Milk chocolate is sweet chocolate that additionally contains milk powder or condensed milk. White chocolate contains cocoa butter, sugar, and milk, but no cocoa solids. Dark chocolate is produced by adding fat and sugar to the cacao mixture, with no milk or much less than milk chocolate.
Custards
These kinds of desserts usually include a thickened dairy base. Custards are cooked and thickened with eggs. Baked custards include
crème brûlée and
flan. They are often used as ingredients in other desserts, for instance as a filling for pastries or pies.
Deep-fried
Many cuisines include a dessert made of deep-fried starch-based batter or dough. In many countries, a
doughnut is a flour-based batter that has been deep-fried. It is sometimes filled with custard or jelly.
Fritters are fruit pieces in a thick batter that have been deep fried.
Gulab jamun is an Indian dessert made of milk solids kneaded into a dough, deep-fried, and soaked in honey.
Churros are a deep-fried and sugared dough that is eaten as dessert or a snack in many countries.
Doughnuts are most famous for being a trademark favorite of fictional character
Homer Simpson from the
animated television series ''
The Simpsons''.
Frozen
Ice cream,
gelato,
sorbet and shaved-ice desserts fit into this category. Ice cream is a cream base that is churned as it is frozen to create a creamy consistency. Gelato uses a milk base and has less air whipped in than ice cream, making it denser. Sorbet is made from churned fruit and is not dairy based. Shaved-ice desserts are made by shaving a block of ice and adding flavored syrup or juice to the ice shavings.
Gelatin
Jellied desserts are made with a sweetened liquid thickened with gelatin or another thickening agent. They are traditional in many cultures.
Grass jelly and
annin tofu are Chinese jellied desserts.
Yōkan is a Japanese jellied dessert. In English-speaking countries, many dessert recipes are
based on gelatin with fruit or whipped cream added. The vegetarian substitute for Gelatin is
Agar.
Marshmallow is also most commonly made with gelatin.
Pastries
Pastries are sweet baked pastry products. Pastries can either take the form of light and flaky bread with an airy texture, such as a
croissant or unleavened dough with a high fat content and crispy texture, such as
shortbread. Pastries are often flavored or filled with
fruits,
chocolate,
nuts, and
spices. Pastries are sometimes eaten with
tea or
coffee as a breakfast food.
Pies, cobblers, and clafoutis
Pies and cobblers are a crust with a filling. The crust can be either made from either a pastry or crumbs. Pie fillings range from fruits to puddings; cobbler fillings are generally fruit-based. Clafoutis are a batter with fruit-based filling poured over the top before baking.
Sweet soups

Tong sui, literally translated as "sugar water" and also known as tim tong, is a collective term for any sweet, warm
soup or
custard served as a dessert at the end of a meal in
Cantonese cuisine. ''Tong sui'' are a Cantonese specialty and are rarely found in other
regional cuisines of China. Outside of Cantonese-speaking communities, soupy desserts generally are not recognized as a distinct category, and the term ''tong sui'' is not used.
Wines
Dessert wines are sweet
wines typically served with dessert. There is no simple definition of a dessert wine. In the UK, a dessert wine is considered to be any sweet wine drunk with a meal, as opposed to the white
fortified wines (fino and amontillado sherry) drunk before the meal, and the red fortified wines (
port and
madeira) drunk after it. Thus, most fortified wines are regarded as distinct from dessert wines, but some of the less strong fortified white wines, such as
Pedro Ximénez sherry and
Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise, are regarded as honorary dessert wines. In the United States, by contrast, a dessert wine is legally defined as any wine over 14%
alcohol by volume, which includes all fortified wines - and is taxed at higher rates as a result. Examples include
Sauternes and
Tokaji Aszú.
Gallery
File:Apple pie.jpg|Apple pie
File:Baked Alaska (5097717743).jpg|Baked Alaska, ice cream and cake topped with browned meringue
File:Baklava - Turkish special, 80-ply.JPEG|Baklava, a pastry comprising layers of filo with chopped nuts, sweetened and held together with syrup or honey
File:Homemade Flan.jpg|Baked custard
File:Brennan's Bananas Foster.jpg|Bananas Foster, made from bananas and vanilla ice cream with a sauce made from butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, dark rum and banana liqueur
File:Plain cheesecake.jpg|Cheesecake, a type of dessert with a layer of a mixture of soft, fresh cheese, eggs and sugar
File:Cannoli siciliani (7472226896).jpg|Cannolis with Pistachio Grain, Candied and Chocolate Drops
File:Chocolate mousse.jpg|Chocolate mousse, a chocolate variety of a dessert incorporating air bubbles to give it a light and airy texture
File:Coconutbar.jpg|Coconut bar, made with coconut milk and set with either tang flour and corn starch, or agar agar and gelatin
File:Creme brulee.jpg|Preparation of crème brûlée, a rich custard base topped with a contrasting layer of hard caramel
File:Egg custard tart by Stu Spivack.jpg|Egg custard tarts, a pastry originating from Guangzhou, China.
File:Hwangnam bread (cropped).JPG|Gyeongju bread, a small pastry with a filling of red bean paste
File:씨앗호떡.jpg|Hotteok (a variety of filled Korean pancake) with edible seeds, sugar, and cinnamon
File:Kkultarae, Korean court cake.jpg|Kkultarae, fine strands of honey and maltose, often with a sweet nut filling
File:Jell-o cream cheese square.jpg|Jell-o cream cheese square
File:Lemon tart (cropped).jpg|Lemon tart, a pastry shell with a lemon-flavored filling
File:Mämmi, memma.jpg|Mämmi, a Finnish Easter dessert
File:Pastry assortment.jpg|An assortment of pastries
File:Rum cake.jpg|Rum cake, a type of cake containing rum
File:King of Spotted Dicks.jpg|Spotted Dick
File:Tiramisu with blueberries and raspberries, July 2011.jpg|Tiramisu
File:Banana pudding, homemade.jpg|Homemade banana pudding
By continent
Africa
Throughout much of central and western Africa, there is no tradition of a dessert course following a meal.
Fruit or fruit salad would be eaten instead, which may be spiced, or sweetened with a sauce. In some former colonies in the region, the colonial power has influenced desserts – for example, the Angolan ''cocada amarela'' (yellow coconut) resembles baked desserts in Portugal.
Asia

In Asia, desserts are often eaten between meals as snacks rather than as a concluding course. There is widespread use of rice flour in East Asian desserts, which often include local ingredients such as coconut milk, palm sugar, and tropical fruit. In India, where sugarcane has been grown and refined since before 500 BC, desserts have been an important part of the diet for thousands of years; types of desserts include
burfis,
halvahs,
jalebis, and
laddus.
Dessert nowadays are made into drinks as well, such as
Bubble Tea. It is originated in Taiwan, which locates in East Asia. Bubble tea is a kind of dessert made with flavor tea or milk with tapioca. It is well-known across the world.
Recently, CNN Travel released a list of 50 of the world’s best desserts after travelling around the world and one of the items on the list is cendol. While the origins of cendol are not confirmed, there have been reports that it either came from Malaysia or Indonesia.
India
Europe

In Ukraine and Russia, breakfast foods such as
nalysnyky or
blintz or oladi (pancake), and
syrniki are served with
honey and
jam as desserts.
In the Netherlands
vla is a popular dessert. It's a custard-like dessert that's served cold. Popular flavours are: vanilla, chocolate, caramel, and several fruit flavours. There's also hopjesvla which is flavoured like a
Hopje: a Dutch coffee&caramel sweet.
North America
European colonization of the Americas yielded the introduction of a number of ingredients and cooking styles. The various styles continued expanding well into the 19th and 20th centuries, proportional to the influx of immigrants.
South America
Dulce de leche is a very common confection in Argentina. In Bolivia, sugarcane, honey and coconut are traditionally used in desserts.
''Tawa tawa'' is a Bolivian sweet
fritter prepared using sugar cane, and ''helado de canela'' is a dessert that is similar to sherbet which is prepared with cane sugar and cinnamon.
Coconut tarts, puddings cookies and candies are also consumed in Bolivia.
Brazil has a variety of candies such as
brigadeiros (chocolate fudge balls),
cocada (a coconut sweet),
beijinhos (coconut truffles and clove) and romeu e julieta (cheese with a guava jam known as
goiabada). Peanuts are used to make
paçoca,
rapadura and
pé-de-moleque. Local common fruits are turned in
juices and used to make
chocolates,
ice pops and
ice cream. In Chile, ''kuchen'' has been described as a "trademark dessert."
Several desserts in Chile are prepared with ''manjar'', (caramelized milk), including ''
alfajor'', ''
flan'', ''cuchufli'' and ''
arroz con leche''.
Desserts consumed in Colombia include
dulce de leche, waffle cookies, puddings, nougat, coconut with syrup and thickened milk with sugarcane syrup. Desserts in Ecuador tend to be simple, and desserts are a moderate part of the cuisine.
Desserts consumed in Ecuador include
tres leches cake, flan, candies and various sweets.
Oceania
Desserts are typically eaten in Australia, and most daily meals "end with simple desserts", which can include various fruits.
More complex desserts include cakes, pies and cookies, which are sometimes served during special occasions.
Market
The market for desserts has grown over the last few decades, which was greatly increased by the commercialism of baking desserts and the rise of food productions. Desserts are present in most restaurants as the popularity has increased. Many commercial stores have been established as solely desserts stores.
Ice cream parlors have been around since before 1800.
Many businesses started advertising campaigns focusing solely on desserts. The tactics used to market desserts are very different depending on the audience for example desserts can be advertised with popular movie characters to target children. The rise of companies like
Food Network has marketed many shows which feature dessert and their creation. Shows like these have displayed extreme desserts and made a game show atmosphere which made desserts a more competitive field.
Desserts are a standard staple in restaurant menus, with different degrees of variety. Pie and cheesecake were among the most popular dessert courses ordered in U.S. restaurants in 2012.
Top desserts ordered in restaurants 2012
Technomic, Inc. September 2012. Retrieved 3 December 2013.
Nutrition
Dessert foods often contain relatively high amounts of sugar and fats and, as a result, higher calorie counts per gram than other foods. Fresh or cooked fruit with minimal added sugar or fat is an exception.
See also
* Chinese desserts
* Culinary art
* hRecipe – a microformat for marking-up recipes in web pages
List articles
* List of desserts
* List of dessert sauces
* List of Bangladeshi sweets and desserts
* List of foods
* List of Indian sweets and desserts
* List of Indonesian desserts
* List of Italian desserts
* List of Pakistani sweets and desserts
* List of Sri Lankan sweets and desserts
* List of Turkish desserts
References
Notes
Further reading
*
*
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Category:Courses (food)