A plastic baby (representing baby Jesus) is buried somewhere in the cake and whoever gets the piece with the baby has to host the next year's Mardi Gras king cake party.
Put all pastry ingredients into the bread machine per your machine's instructions. Typically you put in all the wet ingredients, then all dry ingredients, and put the yeast in last. Run the bread machine on the dough cycle.
Remove from the bread machine, cover and allow to rise for two hours or until doubled in size.
To make the filling: combine the brown sugar, ground cinnamon, chopped pecans, 1/2 cup flour and 1/2 cup raisins. Pour 1/2 cup melted butter over the cinnamon mixture and mix until crumbly.
Rip off pieces of dough and make long strips out of them (about 2.5 inches wide). I didn't find the dough to be easy to roll so I basically just pressed it into the thin strips.
Spread the filling down the center of the strip.
Fold the top and the bottom of the strip around the filling to form a log.
Stretch the log out to make it as thin as as you can without it breaking.
Start on one end of the log and roll it until it fits snugly in a cupcake liner. Break it off, put it in the liner and continue rolling sections of the log.
Bake at 350 F for 20 min.
Cinnamon Mascarpone Frosting Instructions
Whip whipping cream in mixer until soft peaks begin to form.
Fold in mascarpone.
Mix in cinnamon.
Slowly add the confectioner's sugar, being careful not to over-whip frosting.