Confects

Part of speech: noun, verb

Definitions

1. To prepare or make a sweet delicacy often using fruits, nuts, or spices
2. To create or devise something by combining various elements, especially in a skillful way
3. To produce a mixture of items or ingredients for the purpose of enjoyment or consumption

Etymology: The verb "confect" is a case of a word that took two very different paths into English. The verb itself comes straight from Latin "cōnficere", meaning "to make together" or "to finish", built from "com-" ("together") and "facere" ("to make"). Its past participle "cōnfectus" gave English a word for something put together with care, and the sense of skillful assembly from varied parts grew out of that original idea of making things completely and carefully. Its sibling is far more familiar, and it is a doublet, meaning the same Latin root arrived twice by different routes. "Cōnfectum", a neuter form of the same participle, was borrowed in the sense of a sweetmeat, and that is where English gets "comfit", a candied sugar-coated seed or sweet. The verb and the sweet share one ancestor but ended up describing a process of assembling and an edible result.

Synonyms: sweets, confections, treats, delicacies, desserts