The Deep History of Pecans in the Americas

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A Journey from French Nobility to Indigenous-Creole Heritage

• César, duc de Choiseul, comte du Plessis-Praslin (1598–1675) was a French nobleman.
   
• His personal chef Clément Lassagne—whose identity remains uncertain—created a sweet by coating almonds in caramelized sugar.
   
• The candy was called “praslines” after the count’s title Praslin.
   
• This was the European court version, made with almonds, refined sugar, and butter.
   

• As French settlers and officials arrived in Louisiana, they brought the praline recipe with them.
   
• Local cooks, Original Indigenous women, adapted the recipe using pecans, native to the region, instead of almonds.
   
• Cane sugar and natural ingredients grown in the warm Gulf soil gave a richer flavor.
   

• In New Orleans, original Indigenous women vendors—known locally as “pralinieres”—sold pralines on the streets.
   
• These women preserved the recipe’s spirit but infused it with soul and earth connection:
   
  • Pecans (native nut of the Mississippi Valley)
     
  • Cane sugar from the delta
     
  • Cream and butter from local farms
     
• The result was a new, copper-toned confection that symbolized the blending of French technique and American Indian earth wisdom.
   

• Pralines became a signature candy of New Orleans and Louisiana culture, representing resilience, heritage, and ancestral creativity.
   
• Modern praline makers still use traditional methods passed down by American Indian matriarchs, often by hand in copper pots.
   
• What began in a French noble’s kitchen evolved into a heritage food of the Americas, rooted in Indigenous ingenuity and survival.
   

The praline’s French name hides an American spirit:

• Born in Europe.
   
• Transformed in Louisiana.
   
• Perfected by American Indian cooks whose copper hands and hearts turned sugar and pecans into a legacy.

• He served as chef to César, duc de Choiseul, comte du Plessis-Praslin in the 1600s.
   
• According to later culinary historians, Lassagne created the sweet almond confection that the Count shared with visiting dignitaries.
   
• Because the delicacy became famous through the Count, it took his title’s name — “prasline” — rather than the chef’s.
   

There’s very little verifiable documentation from the 17th century directly naming Lassagne as the inventor.
The name appears in oral culinary tradition and in some 19th-century French cookbooks recounting the praline’s origin story.
It’s very possible that he had assistants or kitchen staff of Indigenous American ancestry, but records from that era erased the identities of non-noble and non-European individuals in elite households.

• César de Choiseul’s household produced the original almond “prasline.”
   
• Clément Lassagne is the earliest named cook associated with it.
   
• The true transformation into the Louisiana pecan praline — the one we’re building on through Puk-Kon Kandy — was accomplished much later by American Indian women in the Gulf region, whose names often went unrecorded but whose recipes endure. We are keeping their legacy alive with Puk-Kon Kandy.