Doktor Dough

Tuesday February 16, 2010 is Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday. The end of the Carnival season. Actually, I got myself quite confused and decided two weeks ago that Mardi Gras was on February 2; I have no idea where the idea came from but it was solidly embedded. So I quick baked a King Cake just in time. Well, it was early but turned out to be a good thing, ’cause I never got around to baking another this year.

I had my first King Cake, actually a Galette des Rois, in France in January 1994 for the Fete des Rois.  They generally look like this:

They are very refined: almond paste layered between pastry sheets. There is a porcelain figurine inside it and if you find it you host the next celebration. Or you have good luck or something. My attempt last year to make one of these was not so successful; better left to the professionals.

Then in 1996 I moved to New Orleans and discovered a whole new King Cake custom.  Like many things in New Orleans, it is over the top. The Carnival season starts on January 6, Epiphany, and the celebration gains steam through Mardi Gras. And there isn’t just a King Cake on the sixth nor are the parties limited to weekends only, it is an everyday ocurrence. The Cakes look something like this:

My King Cake 2010

 They are nothing like the ones in France. As with many things in the Big Easy, they are as unassuming as the French are sophisticated. Garishly decorated with brightly colored icing and sugar on top of a yeast dough and filled with a cheese type filling or nuts with cinnamon and sugar, they are available on every street corner. Yum! Some of the grocery store varieties are tasty and then there is the famous Gambino’s Bakery version, one of my favorites. Each cake contains a plastic baby. That about sums up the differences.

Inspired by my cousin Mary, this was my first go at the New Orleans version. Tasty.

At midnight on Mardi Gras the Mayor of New Orleans accompanied by the NOPD will ride on horseback through the French Quarter and Carnival will end. So we will enter the season of contemplation.