Sunday, May 15, 2011

King Cake

For W's wine party I was feeling super ambitious so besides the homemade girl scout cookies, I decided, that since Mardi Gras was near (yes, this post, as many of my posts are, is very late :P ) I would also make a king cake. For those of you who don't know what a king cake is, a king cake is a cake used to celebrate the coming of Mardi Gras. It is usually a ring of twisted bread similar to brioche decorated with icing or sugar in the colors of Mardi Gras, purple, green, and gold. Often there is a trinket, usually in the form of a little plastic baby (thought to represent Baby Jesus), hidden somewhere in the cake. Whoever gets the slice with the trinket in it is considered the king or queen of the party and has an obligation to bring the king cake for next year.



The king cake I made was based on this recipe by Emeril Lagasse. I made two changes to the recipe, one was I added a teaspoon each of orange zest and cinnamon to the dough. The second was I substituted in an different icing recipe because I made this cake last year and didn't like the icing. The cake came out overall pretty good, though a little bit on the dry side if you don't have icing on the side to dip the cake in. To combat the dryness I think next year I shall try making a king cake with a filling.

Recipe Links: King Cake (plus a teaspoon each of orange zest and cinnamon)
King Cake Icing

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