Galettes des Rois à la Confiture de Lait/ French King's Cake with Milk Jam

Galettes de Rois is well known as King's cake in France, this cake can be called as three kings cake,king cake, king's cake and its easily available during the festival of Epiphany at the end of the Christmas season. Traditional King's cakes are made of sweet brioche dough in the shape of a hollow circle with a glazed topping sprinkled with coloured sugar. Though this yeasted brioche bread style of king cake do exists, king cakes are also made with puff pastry sheets, filled with a delicious fillings along with a small figurine hidden inside. The most well known filling of this King's cake is frangipane filling which is prepared usually with almond powder, however now many King's cake with different fillings are easily available in stores. Every year, these King's cake have their important place in every home especially after New year.Many people says that the small figurine hidden inside the cake represents Baby Jesus, but now the figurine changes from Bakery to bakery and often represents a hit movie or other cultural icon.

The king cake, traditionally exists in three version, in Northern france, Quebec and Belgium, this cake is called Galette des rois which consists of flaky pastry layers with a filling while in the West of France as a sablé galette is made, a form of sweetcrust pastry.In southern France this king cake is called Gateau des rois or royaume. After baking so many versions of this King's cake, my today's post goes to an another delicious filling which i simply prepared with Milk Jam aka Dulce de leche along with the usual frangipane filling. This milk jam is simply prepared with sweetened condensed milk which asks for long cooking process though this delicious milk jam is very simple to make and its our family favourite. Am running a long blogging marathon for this whole month of April with Journey through the cuisines as this month's theme and am posting dishes from French cuisine.

Frangipane - Confiture de Lait filling:

1cup Almond powder

2nos Eggs

1/2cup Confiture de lait/Milk Jam/Dulce de leche

1/4tsp Almond essence

1/4cup Butter (room temperature)

Beat the butter,milk jam together in a bowl until they turns soft, add the eggs one by one and finally add the almond powder,almond essence, mix everything well and keep the bowl in fridge for half an hour.

For Assembling:

1no Egg yolk

1tbsp Milk

2no Puff Pastry sheets

Preheat the oven to 350F.

Place a puff pastry sheet over a baking tray,brush the edges of the pastry sheet with the egg-milk mixture.

Pour the already prepared almond mixture over the pastry sheet and spread them evenly,dont spread over the brushed egg mixture.

Place the another pastry sheet over and give a press over the edges,so that they get well stick.

Make a small hole in the middle of the pastry sheet and with a knife make some lines over the pastry sheet as your desire.

Brush now the pastry sheet with the remaining egg-milk mixture and bake in middle rack of the oven for 20-25minutes or until they turned brown.

Slice it and enjoy.

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