Quick Guide to French Food Terms

French cuisine has given us dozens of words and phrases that are now part of general English usage and new ones appear on restaurant menus all the time. Here's a quick A-Z selection of some of them, including descriptions of classic French sauces for those who can't remember the difference between Béchamel and Béarnaise.

Amuse bouche: A showy, delicious bite-sized morsel, presented to restaurant diners at the start of a meal, compliments of the chef.

Ballotine: Meat, especially chicken, deboned and stuffed with any of a variety of fillings, from foie gras to seafood, wrapped in clingfilm. Can be braised, poached or baked.

Béchamel: A basic white sauce of butter and milk (no eggs), thickened with flour. Variations include Sauce Mornay.

Béarnaise: A classic sauce made from egg yolks and clarified butter, with white wine and onions or shallots, flavoured with tarragon and chervil. Good with steak.

Beurre blanc: A sweet butter sauce flavoured with sweet white wine or lemon juice.

Clafoutis: A sweet dish, of fruit baked in a batter matrix.

Coulis: Puréed fruit or vegetables.

Crème anglaise: An egg-based sauce, similar to English custard.

En papillote: Wrapped and cooked in special paper or sometimes foil. NB: paper inedible!

Espagnole: A classic brown sauce, made with roux, veal stock, beef (bones), vegetables and seasoning.

Feuilletée: Puff pastry ('feuille' means 'leaf'). See also Mille-feuille.

Fondant: A sugar-based sweet that can be variously flavoured. May also refer to croquettes made of meat, fish, or vegetables (such as potatoes).

Galantine: Similar to a ballotine, but served cold, often encased in aspic.

Galette: a round pastry (like a rimless pie base) or savoury pancake.

Goujon: In French cuisine a goujon is usually breaded, deep-fried fish, but the term is now used also for other meats in breadcrumbs, cut in strips and deep- or pan-fried.

Hollandaise: A classic white sauce enriched with egg yolks and flavoured with lemon juice.

Jus: The juices from roasted meat, sometimes further prepared to make a thin gravy.

Lardon: Cubed meat, typically bacon or ham.

Mille-feuille: Meaning 'a thousand leaves', this puff pastry is made of multiple layers of ultra-thin pastry leaves.

Mornay: Another classic rich French sauce, enriched with egg yolks and flavoured with cheese.

Noisette: Literally a hazelnut, small 'nuggets' of meat, especially lamb, or vegetable.

Quenelle: A small pillow-shaped dumpling, containing veal, fish, or poultry, poached in stock.

Rémoulade: A mustardy mayonnaise-based sauce flavoured with herbs, capers, anchovies and pickles.

Roux: The most basic ingredient of classic sauces, consisting of flour blended with fat.

Rouille: A mayonnaise, often with a fish stock base, flavoured with chillies and garlic.

Suprême: A classic sauce made from light meat stock (chicken, sometimes veal), with cream.

Timbale: Food cooked in a timbale, a thimble shaped container with sloping sides.

Velouté: From the French word for 'velvet', a classic sauce made using meat, poultry or fish stock, thickened with butter and flour.

For those seeking an almost exhaustive list of French culinary terms and dishes, patriciawells.com offers a downloadable glossary.