Since Fat Tuesday is coming up, I thought I’d share an easy king cake recipe my friend Rebecca told me about – she calls it the Trailer Park version of king cake but I call it the Why Scratch-Bake Anything king cake. Since I hate to cook more than I hate unhealthy packaged baking goods, this one is for me.
I won’t take up space here with the story of King Cake at Mardi Gras – read the wiki if you’re interested.  I will say that if you had the forethought and $$ to order your cakes delivered from Randazzo’s, Haydel’s, or Gambino’s, your cake will be more delish. It’s too late now though, as they are all closing up to enjoy the parades themselves.  So, if you just want to toss together a little Bon Temps surprise for your family or friends, try this one. It gets very few complaints here on Allrecipes.com.
Ingredients:
3 (14 ounce) cans refrigerated sweet roll dough (NOTE – reviewers suggest combining 1 orange flavor with 2 cinnamon. Â Also, be prepared to have to “mush” together or braid the dough rolls if you get Pillsbury).
2 (12 fluid ounce) cans creamy vanilla ready-to-spread frosting (NOTE – most reviewers just used the frosting that comes with. as you can see from the pic, it’s not supposed to be frosted as much as glazed).
1/4 cup milk (only if you use canned frosting – you won’t need to thin the glaze that comes with the cinnamon rolls)
2 drops green food coloring
2 drops yellow food coloring
1 drop red food coloring
1 drop blue food coloring
NOTE: here I have to disagree. King cakes don’t have COLORED icing, they have colored SUGAR sprinkles. Purple, Green & Gold. But if you really can’t find colored sprinkles in PG&G (yellow) then of course you can go to the trouble of dying your icing. But it ain’t legit, just so’s you know.
1/2 cup multi-colored sprinkles
Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a baking sheet.
Open the cans of sweet roll dough and unroll the dough from each can into 3 strands. Working on a clean surface, place 3 dough strands side by side and gather them together to make one large strand. NOTE: Several reviewers suggest sort of braiding them, so they don’t separate when baking.
Fold this in half, and roll slightly to make a fat log. Repeat steps with the remaining dough. Place each log on the prepared baking sheet and shape to make a ring, overlapping the ends and pinching them together to make a complete circle. Pat the dough into shape as necessary to make the ring even in size all the way around. Cover loosely with foil.
Bake in preheated oven until firm to the touch and golden brown, 30 to 40 minutes. NOTE: This is clearly tricky. Some say 25 minutes, the recipe calls for 50-60!! Check often for doneness so the ring doesn’t overbake.
Place on a wire rack and cool completely. Place the cake ring on a serving plate. Cut a slit along the inside of the ring and insert a small plastic baby, pushing it far enough into the cake to be hidden from view.
Spread the icing thinly and evenly over the top of the cake. Sprinkle Purple Green & Gold sugar sprinkle in thick sections around the cake. Like the picture. There you have it – a fast & easy Mardi Gras King Cake.
The person who gets the baby gets to be “king” for the day. And has to bring the next king cake to the next party. It can go on for weeks if you want. Cuz that’s just how they roll down there.
If you are going the colored icing route-Divide the frosting evenly between 4 bowls. Stir 1 tablespoon of milk into each bowl to thin the frosting. Use the frosting in one bowl to drizzle over the cooled cake. To the remaining three bowls of frosting, stir yellow food coloring into one and green into another. Stir the red and blue food colorings together with the frosting in a third bowl to make purple frosting. Drizzle the cake with yellow, green, and purple frostings in any desired pattern. Dust the cake with multi-colored sprinkles.
