King Cake Recipe

Inspired by my high school French Teacher, Mrs. Hines

Cake Recipe, Dessert Recipe, Mardi Gras Celebrations

Ingredients

Dough Ingredients

• 1/2 cup warm water
• 2 packages active dry yeast
• 1/2 cup pure cane sugar
• 3 1/2 – 4 1/2 cups unbleached all purpose flour, unsifted
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg, freshly grated
• 2 teaspoons salt
• Zest of one lemon
• 1/2 cup warm buttermilk
• 5 egg yolks at room temperature, organic preferred
• ½ cup of softened butter plus 2 Tablespoons
• 1 egg slightly beaten with 1 tablespoon milk
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon

Optional traditional King Cake includes a small hidden token such as a tiny baby doll, bean, or gold coin

Filling

• ½ cup melted unsalted melted butter, organic preferred
• ¾ cup of brown sugar
• 2 Tablespoons Cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon sorghum (I use local but Bourbon Barrel Foods makes a fine product)
• ¾ cup coarsely chopped pecans (if I want to get really fancy I use black walnuts)

Glaze

• 2 Cups of powdered sugar
• 4 Tablespoons unsalted butter, organic preferred
• 1 teaspoon vanilla (I used Woodford Reserve Bourbon instead)
• 3 – 6 Tablespoons of Milk

OPTIONAL Sprinkle sugars in Mardi Gras Colors Green, Purple and Yellow

Method

1. In a small shallow bowl, add warm water, yeast and about 2 teaspoons of sugar. Let set in a warm place for about five to seven minutes, until the combination bubbles and gets frothy.

2. In the meantime, use a large mixing bowl to combine 3 ½ cups of flour, the rest of the sugar, nutmeg and salt. Whisk through to blend ingredients and add air to the flour.

3. Make a well in center of flour mixture, add lemon zest, yeast liquid, buttermilk and egg yolks.

4. You could use a wooden spoon to slowly work this, but I use my handy dandy Kitchen aide stand mixture with a dough hook.

5. Add butter a little at a time, working the dough until it pulls away from the sides making a soft smooth glob. Depending on your flour, you may need to add small increments of additional flour to achieve a smooth elastic texture. I usually work the dough in the mixer for about seven to ten minutes.

6. Gently place the dough ball in a large buttered mixing bowl, cover with a warm damp cloth, and place bowl in a warm draft free location for 1 ½ to 2 hours until dough has doubled in size.

7. Preheat oven to 375.

8. Punch dough down, and on a floured surface roll out dough into a rectangle about 15 x 10. Smear with butter.

9. Mix up brown sugar, sorghum and cinnamon and spread over surface.

10. Sprinkle with nuts.

11. Beginning on the long side of rectangle, roll dough like a jelly roll. Pinch along the seams.

12. Bring the two ends together to form a ring, pinch seam line together.

13. Let dough rest for about 30 minutes in a warm draft-free location.

14. On a baking sheet covered with parchment paper and greased with a little butter, place the cake and bake about 30 to 35 minutes until the product is golden brown.

15. Mix glaze ingredients, adding the milk a little at a time until you get the consteincy of glaze…not thin not thick.

16. Cool cake. (I suppose you are supposed to cool it on a rack. I just put it on a cake pedastal. So sue me) Add glaze. I let the glaze just begin to set up…then add the sugar sprinkles. Down here in the mountains, we don’t have purple sugar. I mixed blue and red sugar crystals with a little of the powdered sugar glaze to create a soft purple.

This is not a dish we serve everyday in Appalachia but it was a fun dish to share with a large group as we celebrate some exciting news here at Friends Drift Inn.

Let the good times roll! Giggles

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