Last weekend in Santa Croce plaza, were displays of the upcoming carnivale floats, as Carnivale is in February, even in Florence. Will try to add photos when time, though I can´t see that I actually took any that day:(.
New Orleans has Mardi Gras, and each year regardless of what country I´m in, we make a King Cake! It´s a glorified colorful large loop of cinnamon bun type cake, filled or not, then iced and/or sprinkled on top with the three colors of Mardi Gras: gold (yellow), purple (deep violet), dark green (grass green). Last year on mardi gras, though they don´t celebrate it, I got to see a "float" anyway: a huge fire truck, with water hoses wrapped over and over along a back bar, in the mardi gras colors: gold, green, purple. Each color ended up being about 3 feet wide by twice that width hanging down, so it seemed like it was a special surprise for mardi gras, in a land which has probably never heard of it,).
will add my recipe for mardi gras King Cake on the other blog. Year before last I made the King Cake into the shape of a Blue Crab. But usually I just make a large loop or one large bun of a cake. Most often, I don´t fill the cake with anything other than basic cinnamon-butter-sugar. If you´re in New Orleans, you can get many fillings, such as apple, cherry, blueberry cheesecake...all fine and good, but too fiddly to make at home, and mostly we just like it a bit more traditional and simple. Usually at home, I decorate it with raisins, or colored powdered sugar glaze or colored sugar, but not both, and usually neither. The color makes it more mardi gras, but it we like ours less sweet.
Thought I´d´make a special Italian Carnevale King Cake this year...
