A high give to Benjamin, who stumbled on the word recherché and suggested we explore it!

It's French for "searched for, or carefully sought out," which is why it looks a bit like the word research. Both recherché and research trace back to the Latin cercher, "to search for," which, interestingly, traces further back to circus, "circle," so let that comfort you whenever your own research is just going in circles!

The word recherché caught on in English thanks to Marcel Proust's book À la recherche du temps perdu, translated as In Search of Lost Time or, less literally, Remembrance of Things Past. 

While we're talking about Proust's book, which opens with the narrator dipping a little cake into his tea and suddenly recalling a related childhood memory, see if you can recall the term this scene inspired, one that means "the way in which a certain smell, taste, or other sensory experience suddenly triggers a specific memory for you, especially a memory that's strong, clear, and emotional." It's "the m_d______ effect."

(To reveal any word with blanks, give it a click.)   

"Recherché" has many definitions in French, one of which is "searched for, or carefully sought out."

It's been around in English since the 1600s and became more popular in the early 1900s thanks to Proust's novel It's still relatively rare here, though.

We use it to mean "cool, exotic, rare, fancy, and/or elegant, maybe even pretentious, as if you really have to search far and wide to find it."

grammatical bits:

Part of speech:

Adjective: "this recherché novel;" "The entire party was unbearably recherché."

Other forms: 

None. If you prefer, you can leave out the accent mark over the final "e."

how to use it:

Because "recherché" is rare, fancy, and foreign, I recommend picking it only when you're certain that your readers will understand it from context. Or when you're joking, trying to sound snobby on purpose, like you might with the words "ooh-la-la," "frou-frou," or "foofaraw."

In English texts, writers have used "recherché" to describe dinners, artwork, writing styles and vocabularies, fields of study, and even people.

examples:

"The banquet was certainly a magnificent one. The guests did full justice to the costly wines, the rare and beautiful fruits, the recherché dishes prepared with so much skill and labor."
 — Bertha M. Clay, Love Works Wonders, 1877

"There are plenty of books on sale with full-page, four-colour glossies of Majorcan dishes, each more recherché, sophisticated and aesthetically presented than the last, none of which was ever tasted by 99% of the population."
 — Tomás Graves, The Guardian, 11 August 2000

has this page helped you understand "recherché"?

Awesome, I'm glad it helped!

Thanks for letting me know!
If you have any questions about this term, please message me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com.

study it:

Explain the meaning of "recherché" without saying "chic" or "chichi."

try it out:

The word "recherché" is so outrageously showy that I can only imagine myself using it to be silly. Let's try that.

Fill in the blank: "Oh, (a fancy thing)? How recherché."

Example: "Oh, heated seats? In your car? For your butts? How recherché."

If you like, use this space to write. (To save your work, copy and paste it into an email or a document.)

before you review, play:

Try to spend 20 seconds or more on the game below. Don’t skip straight to the review—first, let your working memory empty out.

Our game for this month is "The LOL Is In the Details."

I'll give you a vague version of a quote from a funny writer or speaker, then prompt you to liven it up with detail. To see the original quote, scroll all the way down.

Here's an example:

"Don't order any of the faerie food… It tends to make humans a little crazy. One minute you’re snacking, the next minute you’re doing something insane."

Snacking on what? Doing what?

You might say, "One minute you’re sampling a mushroom tart, the next minute you’re doing the Macarena."

And the writer's original version was "One minute you're munching on a faerie plum, the next minute you're running naked down Madison Avenue with antlers on your head."
— Cassandra Clare, City of Bones, 2007

Try this one today:

Headline: "Winner Didn't Even Know It Was Contest"

What kind of contest?

review this word:

1. Opposites of RECHERCHÉ include

A. PLAIN and COMMON.
B. FRESH and ORIGINAL.
C. VAGUE and ANECDOTAL.

2. Proust's novel À la recherche du temps perdu was so popular in English that most of its French title, recherche du temps perdu, has become a term for a type of story: one that _____ the writer's youth.

A. humorously "dramatizes"
B. eagerly "searches" to recall
C. "colors" with age and wisdom

Answers to the review questions: 1. A. If you picked B, "FRESH and ORIGINAL," you might have mistaken "recherché" for "réchauffé." Something recherché is choice, fancy, hard to find; something réchauffé is old, overdone, reheated like leftovers. 2. B From the game: Any unique version of the quote that you created is great! Here's the original: "Winner Didn't Even Know It Was Pie-Eating Contest" —  The Onion, 2001

a final word:

I hope you're enjoying Make Your Point. It's made with love. I'm Liesl Johnson, a reading and writing tutor on a mission to explore, illuminate, and celebrate words. From my blog: On vocabulary...       36 ways to study words.       Why we forget words, & how to remember them.       How to use sophisticated words without being awkward. On writing...       How to improve any sentence.       How to motivate our kids to write.       How to stop procrastinating and start writing.       How to bulk up your writing when you have to meet a word count. From my heart: a profound thanks to the generous patrons, donors, and sponsors that make it possible for me to write these emails. If you'd like to be a patron or a donor, please click here. If you'd like to be a sponsor and include your ad in an issue, please contact me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com. A disclaimer: When I write definitions, I use plain language and stick to the words' common, useful applications. If you're interested in authoritative and multiple definitions of words, I encourage you to check a dictionary. Also, because I'm American, I stick to American English when I share words' meanings, usage, and pronunciations; these elements sometimes vary across world Englishes.