Man Chips Tooth Biting Into Lucky Baby In 3 Kings Cake: Cops

LARCHMONT, NY — A man called cops after he broke a tooth biting into a Three Kings Cake and clamping down on the traditionally lucky figurine inside, police said.

The cake, eaten to mark the Epiphany which for Christians marks the visit of the Magi to the baby Jesus, is usually baked with a toy baby inside it. Whoever finds the toy is considered lucky.

But it left a customer at a Larchmont bakery furious, cops said.

The man called police saying he chipped a tooth on a piece of crown-shaped ceramic baked into a slice of cake bought at La Parisienne Bakery. He said he contacted authorities because, when he called the bakery to complain, "the owner was argumentative."

It appears from the police report that the owner made an attempt to explain that the figurine, or fève, is part of centuries of tradition. When the owner failed to help the irate customer to understand the cultural significance of the baked treat, the tooth-hurt patron said he returned to the bakery in person where the proprietor offered him $100 to go away, according to police.

The complaint was made to police on Jan. 15, but it's unknown when the incident happened. Epiphany was on Jan. 6.

In a traditional kings cake, after the cake is cut, whoever gets the fève wins a prize and is destined to have good fortune — in this case, neither result seems likely.

Efforts by Patch to contact staff at the bakery Wednesday were unsuccessful.

Police told the unhappy cake consumer that his complaint was a civil rather than a law enforcement matter.