pieces en chocolat?

Question

Why pieces en chocolat instead of pieces au Chocolat?  I always thought the principal ingredient of a food used "a la" or "au"..

Maarten Kamp · Answer

Carl,

this is a description of ‘ coins ‘ made of something - which in this case is chocolate, therefore ‘ en chocolat ‘. It could have been ‘ en plastique ‘ or ‘ en céramique ‘ for example.

It is not treated here as one of the ingredients of a recipe. It is treated as the material used in the fabrication of the shape/structure.

If you have a look at the external link below to a brief bio of a celebrated French-Swiss chocolatier, Amaury Guichon, you will see references to ‘ ses sculptures en chocolat ‘, ‘ une girafe en chocolat ‘, ‘ une sculpture géante en chocolat Lego ‘.

He is not creating/making a ‘ new ‘ food using chocolate and other ingredients, but a new shape from/of chocolate.

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amaury_Guichon

Compound nouns formed with prepositions à/de/en in French