Mardi Gras Donuts

Celebrate Fat Tuesday with these easy Mardi Gras Donuts. All dressed up, they’re the perfect centerpiece for your celebration.

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My house gets awfully quiet during the day and so I like to have the tv on in the background while working. Over the holidays I stumbled across a show called The Originals on Netflix. Maybe you’ve heard of it, it’s a vampire flick based in New Orleans. I’ve been catching up on episodes ever since and just finished the final episode of season three. It’s left me slightly obsessed with New Orleans.

My last trip to New Orleans was in 2010 and I am feeling like it might be time for a return trip. A vacation isn’t in the cards right now, so I’m getting my NOLA on by celebrating Mardi Gras this year!

I’ve come up with a bunch of fun to share, but I wanted to kick things off with these fun Mardi Gras Donuts.

In years past I’ve always made a traditional Mardi Gras King Cake, using this Taste of Home recipe, but honestly with all of the other cooking I was doing I didn’t have the two + hours it takes. So…I cheated.

Yep. Totally.

And now, I am going to share my quick hack with you!

Mardi Gras Donuts

Supplies:
Donuts (make your own with this recipe or buy them)
Water
Powdered Sugar
Sprinkles (I used this sparkling sugar in purple, green and yellow)
Plastic Baby

I have to be honest. I didn’t want to spend two hours making a King Cake and I didn’t even want to put in the time to make these delicious Crullers (though they might have looked more authentic), so I purchased super-yummy, ridiculously hard-to-make Cronuts (Croissant Donuts) at the bakery.

Any good King Cake has a little plastic baby inside. I purchased this pack of mini babies ages ago and have been using them for ages. You can come borrow some of mine, or Amazon now has these cute little packages as an “add on item,” so they are super-cheap.

I inserted the baby into the donut just like I would the King Cake. I made a small slit in the bottom of the donut and stuck the baby inside. Traditionally, whomever gets the baby inside their cake is King for the day!

Once the baby was carefully tucked away, it was time to get crazy with sprinkles! I brushed a little sugar water onto the top of each fresh donut with a basting brush and quickly laid down the sprinkles. If you wait to long and the glaze dries, the sprinkles won’t stick!

I am a little particular about how things look so I sprinkled the donuts all by myself, BUT this would be a fantastic party idea for kids.

The donuts make for such a pretty party centerpiece and I feel like I really nailed the spirit of the King Cake tradition.