King Cake
Happy Mardi Gras! We hope you’ll enjoy this delicious King Cake and live your Fat Tuesday dreams before lent…or just cause you like a bread filled with delicious cream cheese goodness.
Supposedly King Cake is something many people eat growing up but having not been Catholic and also not from New Orleans…I was unaware of this tradition until a few years ago when a co-worker enlightened me. She was from Louisiana and every February her parents would ship her a world famous King Cake from New Orleans. The cake was so delicious and she was always nice enough to share it with her office mates. It also came with a fun surprise – a plastic baby inside! Tradition has it that if you get the baby in your slice of cake then you’re “king for a year” and you are in charge of buying/making the cake for everyone the following year. Cute tradition but with a fair amount of potential for swallowing a plastic baby accidentally.
Visiting New Orleans…
Several years ago, after lots of tips from that co-worker… I got the chance to travel down to New Orleans and experience their beautiful architecture and food. Since it wasn’t Mardi Gras season I only had the opportunity to try a sad old sample of King Cake that they serve tourists. It didn’t satisfy the itch. Thankfully a lot of other dishes did!
Last year, after quitting my job and thus losing access to the delicious, shipped-straight-from-NOLA, King Cake, I decided it was time to attempt one myself. Did a few tweaks to get it the way I remembered while chowing down in my office and I think it’s quite the success. If you’re from LA let us know in the comments if I’ve gotten close to the real deal. I hope you enjoy this Mardi Gras King Cake as much as I do!
King Cake
Ingredients
Cake
- 8 oz sour cream
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 tbsp butter
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/4 cup warm water 110 degrees
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1 tbsp active dry yeast
- 380 g bread flour divided
Filling
- 8 oz cream cheese softened
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/8 cup brown sugar
- 1/4 cup white sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup pecans finely chopped
Icing
- 1 cup confectioner's sugar
- 2 tbsp milk
- 1/2 tsp vanilla
- pinch salt
Instructions
Cake
- In a small saucepan, heat the cream cheese, white sugar, butter and salt over medium low heat until incorporated and then cool to about 100 degrees
- Combine the warm water, sugar and yeast in a small bowl and let sit until foamy, about 5-10 minutes
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, add 120 grams of bread flour, 1 egg, the sour cream mixture and the yeast mixture. About a minute, on medium.
- Add an additional 260 grams of flour and switch to the dough hook. Knead on medium for 3-4 minutes until the dough is smooth and not sticky.
- Cover with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature for 1 hour until doubled in size.
Filling & Assembly
- In a small bowl add the cream cheese, cinnamon, sugars, and vanilla. Use a handheld mixer to blend until smooth.
- Add the egg and blend until just combined.
- Prepare a sheet pan with parchment paper.
- After it has risen, turn out the dough onto a floured work surface. Roll the dough out to a 24 inch by 12 inch rectangle.
- Spread the filling over the dough leaving a 2 inch gap at the top. Sprinkle the pecans over the filling.
- Take the long side and begin rolling it toward the 2 inch gap. (Thinking cinnamon buns). Turn the two open ends toward each other to create a circle and pinch it together to seal it shut.
- Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for another hour.
- Preheat the oven to 350. After the rise time, uncover and bake for 25-30 minutes until deep golden brown and set. Allow to cool to room temp.
Icing
- After the cake has cooled. Whisk together the icing ingredients and pour over or use a pastry brush to cover the cake in icing. Use festive Mardi Gras colored sprinkles to decorate your cake!
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