Does Your King Cake Have a Baby In It?

Eating King Cake is a tradition for Mardi Gras season in Louisiana. Recipes vary, but it is usually round or donut-shaped, flavored with cinnamon or even made out of cinnamon roll dough, topped with purple, green, and gold sugar, and has a tiny plastic baby somewhere inside. Whoever is served the piece that contains the baby is the "king," and is obliged to buy the next year's King Cake. The idea began as a European tradition for Epiphany (January 6), and was called Three Kings Cake after the Magi that visited Jesus in Bethlehem. The toy inside represents the baby Jesus.

But for the last few decades, you mostly see King Cakes sold with the plastic baby on top instead of baked inside. Bakeries are fearful of lawsuits from anyone who might choke on the plastic toy. While that is a possibility, there haven't been any cases of that happening. Some bakeries still sell King Cakes with a baby baked inside. You can find those bakeries in an article at The Takeout. ā€‹

If you can't get a cake with a baby baked into it, you can use the baby on top and poke it into the cake if you like. However, pieces served to young children should be thoroughly inspected first, and everyone should be aware of the possibility of biting into it, lest anyone's dental work be put at risk.

(Image credit: Phil Denton

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