This entremets, though simple, can be served at the most sumptuous dinners. Cut a well-pared fresh pineapple across in two; divide the largest end into two parts, and these into medium-sized slices; pare again to have them all of the same size and shape, put them into a vessel and moisten to their height with a cold syrup of twenty-eight degrees; cover with a round piece of paper, and keep them in a cool place. After six hours drain off the syrup, and adding to it a handful of powdered sugar pour it back on the fruit and operate thus twice, but should preserved pineapple be used it will require to be done four times. Bake some savarin paste (No. 148) in a large buttered savarin mold (Fig. 139), or a large cradle mold, and leave stand for twelve hours. Cut this cake straight on top, then into transversal slices of equal thickness, and cover one side of them first with a thin layer of apricot marmalade (No. 3675), then with a layer of Conde preparation (No. 2), range them at once on a baking sheet, bestrew with fine sugar, glaze in a slack oven, and detach from the baking sheet as soon as glazed.

Fasten a round flat of Genoese cake on a dish and on it place a ring of the same or of meringue, having it much higher than the flat itself, but not too wide (this ring is intended to uphold the slices of pineapple); brush it over with apricot marmalade, also the lower Genoese flat, and let dry in the air. Select some good, large, preserved cherries (demi-sucre), wash them in warm water, and place them in a copper vessel with some cold syrup of twenty-eight degrees. Now drain the slices of pineapple, and dress them upright in the center of the ring, one overlapping the other, and bent out slightly so they form the shape of a basket. Then fill the hollow in the inside with the well-drained cherries, dressing them in a pyramid; brush the pineapple over with some fine apricot marmalade, diluted with Madeira wine; surround the base with the slices of glazed savarin, forming them into a pretty crown, and mask the whole lightly with the marmalade. Serve with this entremets a sauce-boatful of the same marmalade diluted with syrup and Madeira wine mixed with a Julienne of candied fruits cut from orange or mandarin peel, pears and apricots, adding a spoonful of pistachios.

To make this entremets more plentiful the crusts can be surrounded at their base with a row of candied greengages, cut in two, and the stones replaced by almond paste (No. 125) flavored with vanilla.

Fig. 575.