TWELFTH NIGHT OR KING'S CAKE

Twelfth Night or King's Cake image

Categories Cake Dairy Egg Dessert Bake Kid-Friendly Mardi Gras Fall Small Plates

Number Of Ingredients 7

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Ingredients

2 Pounds of the Best Flour
12 Eggs
A Cupful of Sugar
A Pound of the Best Butter
1/2 Ounce of Yeast
1/2 Ounce of Salt
Candies to Decorate

Steps:

To make the Cake, take a pound and a half of the above-mentioned quality of flour, and put it in a wooden bread trough. Make a hole in the center of the flour, and put in a half ounce of yeast, dissolved in a little warm water.Add milk or tepid water to make the dough, using milk if you want it to be very rich and delicate, and water if you have not the milk. Knead and mix the flour with one hand, while adding milk or water with the other. Make a dough that is neither too stiff or too soft, and when perfectly smooth set the dough to rise in a moderately warm place, covering with a cloth. Remember that if you use milk to make the dought it must be scalded, that is, must be heated to the boiling point, and then allowed to grow tepid.
Let the dough rise for five or six hours, and, when increased to twice its bulk, take it and add the reserved half pound of flour, into which you will have sifted the salt. Add six eggs, beaten very light with the sugar and butter, and mix all well together, kneading lightly with your hands, and adding more eggs if the dough is a little stiff.
Then knead the dough by turning it over on itself three times, and set to rise again for an hour or three-quarters of an hour. Cover with a cloth. At the end of this time take it up and work it again lightly, and then form into a great ring, leaving of course, a hole in the center. Pat gently and flatten a little. Have ready a baking pan, with a buttered sheet of paper in it, and set the central roll in the middle.
Cover the pan with a clean, stiff cloth, and set the Cake to rise for an hour longer. When well risen, set in an oven a few degrees cooler than that used for baking bread (360°); let bake for an hour and a half; if medium, an hour, and if very small, a half hour. Glace the Brioche lightly with a beaten egg, spread lightly over the top before placing in the oven. Decorate with dragees (French: a small candy), caramels, etc.