Celebrate Mardi Gras NOLA Style With This Easy King Cake (2024)

For the Filling:

• 4 ounces cream cheese

• 1/2 cup brown sugar, packed

• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

• 1/4 cup raisins, soaked in hot water for 15 minutes, drained and patted dry on paper towels

• 1/2 cup pecan halves

For the Cake:

• 2 cans (total of 16 rolls) refrigerated crescent rolls

For the Frosting:

• 1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar

• 3 to 4 tablespoons cream

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• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

• 1 teaspoon purple, green, and yellow sugar crystals, or food coloring

Make the Filling

1. Place the cream cheese, brown sugar, cinnamon, and raisins in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade.

2. Whiz until combined.

3. Add the pecan halves and pulse until the pecans are chopped to about 1/4-inch pieces.

4. Set aside.

Make the Cake

1. Heat the oven to 350 F. Coat a pizza pan or baking sheet with butter-flavored cooking spray.

2. Unroll the crescent roll dough and separate it into triangles.

3. Position the triangles next to each other with the points toward the center, overlapping the long sides about 1/4 inch, forming a large round, on the baking sheet. Where the pieces overlap, press the seams together only in the center of each seam, leaving the ends of the seams unsealed so you can fold them up over the filling.

4. Spread the filling around in a ring covering the center sealed seam of each triangle.

5. Place a small ceramic or heatproof plastic baby or dried bean somewhere in the filling. (The person who gets this piece will have good luck for the year.)

6. Fold the wide end of each triangle toward the center just to the edge of the filling to cover.

7. Pull the pointed ends of the triangles toward the outer rim of the pan to fully enclose the filling, tucking under the points. Lightly press the seams.

8. Bake 20 to 25 minutes or until golden brown. Let cool to room temperature.

Make the Frosting

1. Whisk together the confectioners' sugar, milk or cream and vanilla extract until smooth. The consistency should be fairly thick but still thin enough to slowly drip down the sides. Add more milk as necessary.

2. Spoon the frosting in a circle over the top of the king cake and allow it to slowly drip down the sides.

3. To decorate for Mardi Gras, sprinkle wide stripes of purple-, green- and yellow-colored sugar crystals.

If You're Using Food Coloring

1. Whisk together frosting as described above.

2. Divide the frosting evenly among 3 bowls.

3. Add two drops each of red and blue food coloring to the first bowl to make purple. Use two drops each of yellow and green in the remaining 2 bowls.

4. Scrape each individual bowl of frosting into its own zip-top bag. Squeeze out all the air and seal.

5. Snip off one corner of the bag and use as a pastry bag to pipe wide stripes of frosting onto the king cake. The bags will give you more control than using a spoon or spatula.

6. The frosting should firm up a bit in about an hour.

(Nutrition information is calculated using an ingredient database and should be considered an estimate.)

Recipe Tags:

• cake
• dessert
• cajun
• mardi gras

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