confection

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A sweet food such as a cake, candy, or pastry, often elaborately decorated.

   The table was covered with all sorts of tempting confections.

2. 2
   noun

   Something elaborate, delicate, or showy, often more decorative than useful.

   Her wedding dress was a confection of silk and lace.

3. 3
   noun

   Something invented or made up, often to mislead.

   The lawyer argued that the charges were a confection of the local police.

From Middle English confescioun, borrowed from Old French confeccion (French confection), borrowed from Latin cōnfectiōnem, from confectus, past participle of conficere (“prepare”), from com- (“with”) + facere (“to make, do”). Originally "the making by means of ingredients"; sense of "candy or light pastry" predominant since 1500s.

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