A (, "thousand-sheets"), also known by the names Napoleon, vanilla slice, and custard slice, is a dessert made of puff pastry layered with pastry cream. Its modern form was influenced by improvements made by Marie-Antoine Carême. Traditionally, a is made up of three layers of puff pastry (), alternating with two layers of pastry cream (). The top pastry layer is finished in various ways: sometimes it is topped with whipped cream, or it may be dusted with icing sugar, cocoa, pastry crumbs, or sliced almonds. It may also be glazed with icing or fondant alone, or in alternating white (icing) and brown (chocolate) or other colored icing stripes, and combed to create a marbled effect. History All the elements of the recipe are present in numerous cookbooks since at least the 16th century, but the exact origin of the is unknown. According to the Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets, recipes from 17th century French and 18th century English cookbooks are a precursor to layer cakes. The earliest mention of the name itself appears in 1733 in an English-language cookbook written by French chef Vincent La Chapelle. The 18th century was served stuffed with jam and marmalade instead of cream. In French, the first mention of the appears a little later, in 1749, in a cookbook by Menon: To make a cake, you take puff pastry, make out of it five cakes of equal size, & of the thickness of two coins, in the last one you shall make a hole in the middle in the shape of a Knight's cross, regarding the size you will base yourself on the dish that you will use for service, bake them in the oven. When they are baked & cooled, stack them one on the other, the one with the hole on top, & jams between every cake, [sentence unclear, maybe referring to covering all sides with jam] & ice them everywhere with white icing so that they appear to be a single piece; you can embellish it with some red currant jelly, candied lemon skins & pistachio, you serve them on a plate. The word is not used again in the recipe books of the 18th century. However, under the reign of Napoleon Bonaparte, several of the fanciest Parisian pastry shops appear to have sold the cake. During the 19th century, all recipes describe the cake as filled with jam,