Mardi Gras History: What’s the Deal with the Baby in the King Cake?

When Fat Tuesday rolls around, will you have your King Cake ready? Because any die hard will tell you, it’s just not Mardi Gras without it.

For the Uninitiated 

Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday, is the day before Ash Wednesday, the day that kicks off the 40-day Catholic Lenten season (which ends on Easter Sunday). Lent is a traditionally somber time, a period of reflection and austerity for Catholics, many of which spend the season in atonement and self-denial. That means they give up a number of things, including meat and alcohol.

So before Lent begins, people around the world (Catholics and non Catholics alike) celebrate Fat Tuesday, a day to party, drink, and eat before the fasting period begins. 

The King Cake Looks Familiar

If that King Cake looks a lot like a Rosca de Reyes to you, that’s because it is a Rosca de Reyes. The Mardi Gras King Cake has roots in the traditional cakes baked up for Three Kings Day on January 6.

The cake first popped up about 300 years ago albeit in different form: it was a dry French bread dough topped with sugar. These days it resembles an iced Danish with cinnamon inside and of course, a plastic baby baked in the layers. It’s usually glazed and dusted in colored sugar in the three official Mardi Gras colors: purple (for justice), green (for faith), and gold (for power). Legend has it the first King Cakes made their appearance in the 1870s and came over from France.

So what’s the Deal with Baby?

If your slice of cake has the baby, you’ve won! King Cake parties are usually held in the weeks leading up to Fat Tuesday, with many more slices doled out on Mardi Gras proper. And though every group has it’s own interpretation, if you’ve found the baby, you’re either the king or queen of the party and / or responsible for hosting the next King Cake party. Lucky you.