Fat Tuesday King Cakes

Brought these two HUGE King Cakes to work on Tuesday. No self respecting Mardi Gras festivity would be complete without at least one.


The cakes were gigantic rings of cinnamon roll dough, baked, slathered with yummy doughnut glaze frosting, and crowned with colored sugar crystals. The colors of the sugar crystals are purple representing justice, green representing faith, and gold representing power. A tiny pink plastic baby Jesus is tucked inside right before serving. If you are lucky enough to get a slice of cake with the pink baby inside, then a year of luck and good fortune is yours! You also get the honor of buying the cake the next year.

The tradition comes from French settlers who marked the Feast of the Epiphany with a similar cake. This feast is traditionally celebrated the 12th day after Christmas which was back in January, but the cake is now a staple item used in the weeklong Mardi Gras celebration that preceeds Ash Wednesday.

Epiphany is Greek for "to manifest" or "to show ". The Feast of the Epiphany marks the first manifestation of the birth of Christ to the Gentiles. The Three Kings – Melchor, Gaspar, and Balthazar — had come from the East in search of the Christ child. That's why this 12th day after Christmas is called King's Day. So a King Cake for the King's Day.

The Three Kings, also known as the Magi or the Wise Men, brought with them gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh – gold signifying that Jesus is King; frankincense, the symbol of prayer, signifying that Jesus is the Son of God, and myrrh, which is used to anoint the dead, signifying that Jesus would die for the salvation of all.

This is my faith. We have some fun and tradition that is rich ... and tasty! I bought these wonderful cakes from Brown's Bakery in Oklahoma City. I had to order them a week in advance because the cakes from Brown's are so very good. Each of these large cakes only lasted about an hour in the office. Melt a pat of real dairy butter on a slice and enjoy. It's just wonderful.

I hope your Fat Tuesday celebration went as well as ours!

I did make one mistake though. I took this picture without thinking. If you are like my beloved Miss Sunshine, then you'll want to know what is in that tiny sack on top of the king cakes. Yep, it was one Brown's turboFat, heart attack donuts that is absolutely so good it is too die for. I was caught dead to rights. I think that if the truth were known, maybe it was the frosting on my shirt that really gave me away. Do you forgive me for breaking the diet? Even though I'm all sugared up, I love you Baby. Kiss me quick, I'm still sweet ;-)