February 16, 2010 The restaurant where I work has been
collecting order forms for king cakes for the past few weeks.
The other night, a woman who had recently moved to the States
asked me about the cake and its importance to American culture.
Unfortunately, all I could tell her at the time was that it is
served during Mardi Gras and is very popular in New Orleans. But
the cake’s history actually starts way back in Europe. In the
book “Mardi Gras, gumbo, and zydeco: readings in Louisiana
culture,” Marcia Gaudet writes an essay about today’s king cake
and the European Epiphany cake from which it evolved. The Feast
of Epiphany is celebrated in many Western branches of the
Christian faith on January 6, the proverbial “twelfth day of
Christmas.” It commemorates the day when the three wise men—also
called magi, or kings—arrived in Bethlehem bearing gifts for the
baby Jesus. Epiphany is also the start of the traditional Mardi
Gras season. King cake is traditionally a yeast-based sweet
bread baked in the shape of a c