Meaning & use
confiture
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Meanings
nouncountable or uncountable
A thick, sweet spread made by cooking fruit with sugar, especially one sold in a small, high-quality jar.
Grammar: Uncountable for the substance: a spoonful of confiture; countable for kinds: three confitures.
Patterns
- confiture of something
She spread apricot confiture on warm brioche.
The market stall sold a confiture of figs and walnuts.
A jar of strawberry confiture came with our breakfast tray.
nouncountable or uncountablespecialist
A savory preserve made by slowly cooking vegetables or onions until soft and sticky, served with meat or cheese.
Grammar: Usually named by its main ingredient: onion confiture.
Patterns
- onion confiture
The chef served duck with a red onion confiture.
A spoonful of tomato confiture lifted the plain cheese sandwich.
We bought a chili confiture to eat with grilled sausages.
Word forms
| plural | confitures |
|---|
Common combinations
- fruit confiture
- The shop sells fruit confiture made from local berries.
- homemade confiture
- Her homemade confiture sold out within an hour.
- onion confiture
- Onion confiture goes well with cold roast beef.
- a jar of confiture
- He brought back a jar of confiture from a small village in France.
Synonyms and how they differ
- jam
- Jam is the ordinary everyday word, while confiture sounds more refined and suggests fruit pieces and small-batch cooking.
- preserve
- Preserve is a wider term for fruit cooked with sugar to keep it, often with larger pieces of fruit than a smooth jam.
- marmalade
- Marmalade is specifically made from citrus fruit, whereas confiture can be made from any fruit.
Word family
- confection noun
- a sweet prepared food or dessert
- confectioner noun
- a person who makes sweets and candies
- confectionery noun
- sweets and chocolates in general
Commonly confused: confiture or confit?
confiture vs confit
Confit is meat, especially duck, slowly cooked and preserved in its own fat; confiture is a sweet fruit preserve.
Practice
At the French bakery we bought fresh bread and a jar of plum ______ to eat with it.
Choose one answer.
Confiture is a sweet fruit preserve you can spread on bread. Confit is preserved meat, which would not be plum-based or sweet.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “confiture”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.