Okay, do you know what tomorrow is? Hint, it’s more than just 2 days before Valentine’s Day. Tomorrow is…..
For those of you that are not familiar with all of the Mardi Gras traditions, there is one called, “King Cake”.
The King Cake is a New Orleans tradition that involves a pastry, a small plastic baby, and a party. The King Cake is baked with a small plastic baby hidden inside, the person who gets the slice with baby in it has to host the next party. It is usually a cinnamon-roll type pastry that is iced and decorated with the Mardi Gras Colors: green, purple, and yellow.
My older son LOVES Mardi Gras and really wants to celebrate in New Orleans some day. Well, it’s not going to be happening this year so to help him celebrate, I put together a Mardi Gras Murder Mystery Party Care Package. You can learn more about it here. Anyway, I wanted to include a Kings Cake but more portable. Here’s what I made.
Rather than putting a baby Jesus into a cupcake, I placed 2 m&ms in 2 of the cupcakes. I thought my son’s friends would enjoy a chocolate surprise! Anyway, I forgot to take pictures of how I made the cupcakes but it’s super easy. Here’s how.
Mini Kings Cakes (Cup Cakes)
Ingredients:
1 box yellow cake mix
Eggs, Oil, Water (what your cake mix instructions states)
Yellow, purple, and green food coloring
M&Ms, Pecan, or Orange slice
Cupcake liners and 2 cupcake baking pans
Directions:
Following your cake mix directions, preheat your oven and make your cake batter.
Place approximately 1/2 of your cake batter into 2 different bowls (1/4 each). Add purple food coloring to one bowl and green to the other. Add yellow food coloring to the remaining (1/2) batter. Mix until thoroughly incorporated.
Line your cupcake baking pans with cup cake liners. Then divide your yellow cake batter between each of the 24 cupcake liners. Then, pick one or two cupcakes and place your M&Ms, pecan or orange slice. Using a spoon drop a spoonful of each the green and purple cake batter on top (do not cover the entire cupcake top…you want some of the yellow to show through). Also, the cupcake(s) that have the surprise, make sure that the green & purple batters cover it.
Bake according to your cake mix directions. Enjoy!
With my son, I chose to have two prizes for those who found the M&Ms instead of the tradition of hosting the next party.
This is a super easy way to incorporate this tradition into your celebration! Have fun tomorrow!
4 You
Susan@Organized31
We lived in Alabama and learned a little about Mardi Gras. Love the mini King Cakes. Going to try this out with my family.
Tasha
We live in SE Texas right on the border of LA. So Mardi Gras is BIG here as well. And since I am married to a Cajun Mardi Gras is well known. Although we don’t go overboard on it at all. It really is just a “party” scene for many. Did you know it is a state holiday in LA?
Love the cupcakes! Will have to remember these next year. Have fun today.
Adrianne at Happy Hour Projects
I never heard of these until yesterday – so cool!! I think I’d like to give them a try next year!
Kadie
How fun! We’ll have to give them a try next year. We don’t do a lot for Mardi Gras all though we should because we are only an hour from the LA boarder.:)