METAIRIE, La. — King Cake season is a shorter one with Mardi Gras early this year.
And one local king cake lover came up with an idea to make getting a variety of the seasonal treat, fast, and easy.
Drive-through king cakes makes so much sense in the New Orleans area. I mean if you don't have to get out of your car for cash, groceries, coffee, medication, and an oil change, why not king cake.
“The wife gets the final say on what kind of king cake?” I ask a man, in the drive-through.
“For this particular brand, yes, because I like vanilla, but she may like the other ones,” he responds.
“Happy wife, happy life,” I tell him.
“That's right,” he says. Then he talks to his wife on speaker phone. “Hey, sweetheart, what kind of king cake do you want?
Now I know what you're thinking, a tent, a dry erase board, and a few tables, why didn't I think of that. But it took a marketing expert, originally from Biloxi, and her Chicago native fiancé to make it happen.
“Thinking about my friends, and so many people that have a hard time getting their kids out the car, they don't have to make so many motions,” Tiffany Langlinais said about one of the reasons she opened the drive-through.
King cakes are serious business for Tiffany. In the 10 years that she's been in the New Orleans area, she has created a spreadsheet with her thoughts about every king cake she's ever tasted.
“I said I already know these are the ones we're going to get, and we'll work through to put some other ones out there that are going to be more specialty products, but these are the ones that I know are going to be crowd pleasers,” she remembers telling her fiancé.
There are king cakes from small startups, to the names that have been around for 75 years.
They open at 7 a.m. only on Fridays through Sundays in the 1000 block of Metairie Road. They are supposed to close at 7 p.m., but they are usually sold out before.
And that's even with calling in reinforcements by the van-full to restock.
“I think the convenience, but I think also being able to try something new,” said a customer.
“Bananas Foster, because I was actually here last week and I saw the menu, and the lady who works here says it's really good if you heat it up. So, I'm very excited to try that,” said another customer.
People start lining up at 6:30 a.m.
“My fiancé will literally drive to the West Bank and go pick up at 5:30 (in the morning) to make sure that these king cakes are straight out of the oven,” Langlinais explained.
And in case you're wondering if Tiffany samples her sweet inventory?
“Pictures are forever, and I used to eat so much king cake every single year,” she said.
And those would be wedding pictures, in her wedding dress, in just 49 days.
Next weekend, the drive through will have boudin king cake and crawfish king cake.
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