French have lots of words for pastries

Roughly translated, pate (pronounced POT) is French for "paste" and refers to clay for pottery. The word gets confused with its more accented derivative, pate (pah-TAY), which means "pie" and originally designated a savory mixture of ground meat or vegetables baked in a crust.

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Gougères

By the way, pate came to refer to the filling itself, and now, when encased by a crust, is more properly referred to as pate en croute (on CROOT).

Pastries, as we know them today, evolved in medieval Europe, when the dominant fats were lard and butter. Unlike the olive oil used by Greek and Roman cooks, butter and lard produced stiffer doughs that made crisp, tasty cases for baked foods.

The French became masters, and though the names of the varieties sound intimidating, some are no more daunting than swapping butter for the lard your grandma used in pie crusts:

pate brisee (pot bree-ZAY): The French term for short-crust pastry, made with butter, flour and water, used for pies, tarts and quiches.

pate sucree (pot soo-KRAY): As above, but sweetened and enriched with egg. Used in pies and tarts.

pate feuilletee (pot fuh-yuh-TAY): French puff pastry. Dough is rolled thin, spread with butter and folded and re-rolled repeatedly to produce multiple flaky layers. True puff pastry (700 microscopically thin layers separated by equally skinny layers of butter) is generally left to professionals, but a more rustic form called "rough puff" or "demi-feuilletee" can be successfully tackled home.

pate a choux (pot ah SHOO): Extremely versatile dough made by boiling water with butter, adding flour, cooking briefly, then beating in eggs. Spoonfuls are dropped or piped onto a baking sheet, resulting in hollow, cloud-like shells. Used for eclairs, cream puffs, and profiteroles (pronounced proh-FIY-ter-olh, often stuffed with ice cream for dessert, savory fillings for canapes). With the addition of cheese, choux pastry becomes gourgeres, a specialty of Burgundy.