Napoleon (pastry)
The
Napoleon is a
pastry made of many layers of
puff pastry with filling alternating the layers. It can be eaten as a
dessert, or even as a decadent meal.
As a French pastry it is called
mille-feuilles, or thousand leaves, and it is usually filled with
whipped cream,
pastry cream, and fruit
preserves - most often
raspberry jam. The topping may be simply powdered sugar, or a layer of fondant, often with strings of chocolate drawn into a chevron design.
In
Italy, where the pastry is thought to have originated in Naples, it is called
mille foglie (again, thousand leaves), and contains a similar layering like the mille-feuilles of cream, pastry cream, and fruit preserves. A savory Italian version consists of puff pastry filled with
spinach,
cheese, or
pesto among other things.
Australia calls its own version of the Napoleon the
vanilla slice.
The most common explanation of the name 'Napoleon' is that it is from
napolitain, the French adjective for the Italian town of
Naples, but altered by association with the name of Emperor
Napoleon I of France. There is no evidence to connect the pastry to the emperor himself.
The time-travel card game
Early American Chrononauts includes a tongue-in-cheek card called Napoleon's Napoleon which players can symbolically acquire from the year 1815.
*
"Napoleon" at Hungry Browser*
Food Timeline, on the origin of the name Napoleon
