King Cake

  4.1 – 80 reviews  • Desserts

With this delicious sticky hoisin pork recipe, you can give pork ribs an Asian twist. Place the ribs in the slow cooker, then return later for a succulent and tender feast. Add coconut rice and cooked broccoli to the dish.

Prep Time: 30 mins
Cook Time: 30 mins
Additional Time: 1 hr 45 mins
Total Time: 2 hrs 45 mins
Servings: 12
Yield: 1 ring shaped loaf

Ingredients

  1. 2 (.25 ounce) packages active dry yeast
  2. ½ cup white sugar
  3. 1 cup warm milk (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
  4. ½ cup butter, melted
  5. 5 egg yolks
  6. 4 cups all-purpose flour
  7. 2 teaspoons salt
  8. 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
  9. 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
  10. 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese
  11. ½ cup confectioners’ sugar
  12. 2 cups confectioners’ sugar
  13. ¼ cup lemon juice
  14. 2 tablespoons milk
  15. 1 tablespoon multicolored candy sprinkles

Instructions

  1. In a large bowl, dissolve yeast and white sugar in warm milk. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.
  2. Stir the egg yolks and melted butter into the milk mixture. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, salt, nutmeg and lemon zest. Beat the flour mixture into the milk/egg mixture 1 cup at a time. When the dough has pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and supple, about 8 minutes. Lightly oil a large bowl, place the dough in the bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 2 hours.
  3. In a small bowl, combine the cream cheese and 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar. Mix well. In another small bowl, combine the remaining 2 cups confectioners’ sugar, lemon juice and 2 tablespoons milk. Mix well and set aside.
  4. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface. Roll the dough out into a 6×30 inch rectangle. Spread the cream cheese filling across the center of the dough. Bring the two long edges together and seal completely. Using your hands shape the dough into a long cylinder and place on a greased baking sheet, seam-side down. Shape the dough into a ring press the baby into the ring from the bottom so that it is completely hidden by the dough. Place a well-greased 2 pound metal coffee can the center of the ring to maintain the shape during baking. Cover the ring with a towel and place in a warm place to rise until doubled in size, about 45 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
  5. Bake in preheated oven until golden brown, about 30 minutes. Remove the coffee can and allow the bread to cool. Drizzle cooled cake with lemon/sugar glaze and decorate with candy sprinkles.

Nutrition Facts

Calories 462 kcal
Carbohydrate 70 g
Cholesterol 128 mg
Dietary Fiber 2 g
Protein 8 g
Saturated Fat 10 g
Sodium 512 mg
Sugars 36 g
Fat 17 g
Unsaturated Fat 0 g

Reviews

Joseph Warren
It’s gonna taste great – even though it’s a bit ugly. I didn’t have yellow or purple sugar, so I colored the icing yellow… and then tried swirls of purple. Decorative fail, but yummy. I made half the recipe and baked it in a pie pan.
Brenda Alvarez
I’ve never heard of using sour cream in a king cake recipe. I’ve made so many of these through my life I could not tell you how many as I am a chef from New Orleans. I’ve also never put lemon zest into a king cake that’s another thing that is unnecessary. Making cakes have yeast sugar milk and vanilla along with eggs butter flour and salt. That’s all that’s needed in a king cake. Original King cakes did not have cream cheese or strawberry or boudin sausage! People getting crazy with they are stuffing king cakes with. Original King cakes we’re only stuffed with a baby! If you want to be authentic with your king cakes use a recipe like mine. They are easier to make and taste very good and that’s what you want on both counts! Not this BS! And you definitely don’t need five eggs especially just the yolk. I use two whole eggs!
Kristine Holland
Lacked flavor.
Katherine Torres
Pretty good. I added a tsp of cinnamon to the dough and will up that the next time I make this. The King Cakes I remember from Baton Rouge and New Orleans had a much more pronounced cinnamon taste than this one. Also, I will add more powdered sugar to the filling next time. It was a little tart for my taste. The texture of the bread was beautiful and the little bit of lemon zest in the dough and juice in the glaze was heavenly.
Dr. Heather Nelson
The plastic baby shouldn’t be baked in the cake. It is generally pushed into the bottom of cake after baking 🙂 great recipe!
Jessica King
I have used this recipe for many years every mardi gras. It’s pretty huge for my fam of 4, but there are never any leftovers. So that says a lot 🙂 currently in the oven now. Happy mardi gras!!!
Kristen Jones
It was very delicious and the best King Cake I have made at home. The dough was a little dense compared to one’s we have tasted in New Orleans. I am not sure if I needed to kneed it longer or if there is an issue with the quality of the flour. But if I can get the bread to be more fluffy and light….it will be perfect!
James White
Love this “cake”!! Beautiful and very, very good. I doubled the filling to make it really stand out. I also used a version of this dough for Easter rolls and cinnamon rolls. So good. I do cut the salt in half, which makes it less salty and I use thicker glaze so it stays in place better. Add at least one more cup of powdered sugar and leave out the milk in the glaze.
Madeline Ramirez
I had never had King Cake before, but I wanted to make this for Mardi Gras to take to work. I used this recipe, and it was wonderful! My coworkers loved it! I had one coworker from New Orleans who raved that this was just like the King Cake from the Big Easy, and the Cakes (I made 2) went fast! I did make a few adjustments based on reviews and taste. I accidentally did 2 c. of confectioner’s sugar to the filling, so I balanced it out with a couple of Tbsp. of lemon juice (gave it a great taste!). I also spread the filling on the dough and rolled it like a jelly roll instead. The lemon and cream cheese was just right, and it balanced the cake perfectly! My only concern with it was that it was very dense and a the bottom burned a little. But overall, it will definitely become a Mardi Gras staple for me!
James Moreno
I am not a bread baker and don’t usually work with yeast, so I was worried about trying to make this. However, I did, and the results were great! I followed the recipe exactly (only 1.5 on the filling, as others suggested and reducing the amount of lemon juice in the glaze). Otherwise, it was easier than I thought it would be! It is time consuming though, the “ready in” time listed on here is probably two hours too short. My dough didn’t seem like it was rising very quickly at all, and after an hour of waiting, I just turned my oven on to 200 and sat the bowl on top of the stove (just to warm it up a bit) and that worked perfectly. I have a lot of family in New Orleans, and I’ve had my share of King Cakes, and this one was delicious. My kids were not a fan of the cream cheese filling, but my husband and I loved it. I had him take it to work, and they finished it off. It’s a pretty good size, bigger than I thought it would be. I will definitely make this again, but maybe I’ll change up the filling so my kids will eat it too. 🙂
Martin Moreno
The ready time is misleading but overall its a good cake.It took a lot longer than I thought it would.
Kelly Clarke
Never made a king cake before! I chose this one because it didn’t contain nuts, as some of the others did. My one significant adjustment was in adding nearly 2 cups more powdered sugar to the glaze. Originally, it was too thin and runny, as well as nearly transparent. I wanted the look and texture of a solid white icing, so I added several more spoonfuls if powdered sugar. Will make again next year!!
Dr. Melanie Drake
I’ve used this with My little variations every year now for several years but we go a little lighter on the nutMeg. It’s written amount is kind of strong in this original recipe for us. Careful with your yeast and follow directions if your new to using it. If you don’t there is a chance it won’t rise. Happy baking and welcome friends and family.
Kenneth Ruiz
This was my first time baking a King Cake and this turned out better than any King Cake that I’ve ever bought. This recipe is a keeper!
Scott Moss
first time making a King Cake and everyone loved it! I found it very easy to make, only change was not adding as much liquid into the glaze at the end, it would have been way to runny. It was beautiful, yummy and easy- thank you!
Jessica Haas
This was my first attempt at a King Cake, I made it for Epiphany with the family. It is a nice, yeasty sweetbread with a delightful cream cheese filling and lemony glaze. I did modify the procedure by using my bread machine. I performed all of the steps the same, just added the ingredients as directed into the bread machine and allowed it to knead/rise in there. I had problems with the center of the cake not fully baking around the can, so perhaps I had the dough too snug around the can? I would advise others to leave a small gap between the center of the ring and the can. Also the glaze, while lemony and delicious, did not adhere well to the cake, and most of it ended up on the plate beneath. I would use a little less liquid next time. The cream cheese layer was still slightly warm when we ate this–what a treat! I would consider using a little more filling next time. We decorated ours generously with colored large granule decorating sugar. This adds to the overall sweetness, and looks great. The family loved this treat, thank you for the great recipe.
Amber Blackburn MD
Absolutely delicious. Though the glaze is very sweet it still tastes good.
Mary Martin
My 11 year old daughter and I made this together and it was wonderful! We doubled the recipe for a Mardi Gras party held for International students. It was gobbled up! One thing I would change – as others have said, making the glaze as written resulted in it running all over the counter. When you make yours, add the liquid slowly to get the consistency you want. I think we added 2x the amount of conf sugar before glazing the second cake and that was perfect. Love it!!! Thanks Arvillalar
Cory Briggs
Great recipe. I did decrease the lemon juice in the glaze after reading the other reviews. Didn’t really measure, just kept adding until I had the taste and consistency I wanted. This was the first time I ever made a king cake and it was a HUGE SUCCESS! Thanks for sharing the recipe!
Richard Garza
No one else mentioned it but I found 4 cups of flour too little for this recipe. It was too gooey to even knead. I added an additional cup of flour and it worked out. Also, I think I prefer the king cakes with a cinnamon roll type filling. This cake was good but not sweet enough for me. If you don’t want an overly sweet roll then this is the recipe for you.
Melinda Morgan
This was great! Made it pretty much to the recipe (ingredients/methods) because I’m not the best baker! I did 1 1/2 the cream cheese filling and 3 Tbsp milk/2Tbsp lemon juice for the glaze – this was a good consistency for drizzling. I did roll up the dough jelly-roll style and tried to twist it as I formed into a ring on my baking sheet. We DID put the baby in before baking after much discussion and he came out unscathed! I made my own colored sugars with food coloring, as I think a true King Cake needs sugar, not sprinkles, on top. Everyone at the party raved over the cake and had seconds. To me, it had a wonderful yeasty cream-cheesy flavor. DH said it could’ve used more filling, but I thought it was fine at 1 1/2. Will save the recipe and make again! Thanks!

 

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