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From this week’s food file: a little sumpin’ sumpin’ for shrimpers, legit French king cake, Blaise’s Taste of Italy and the secret to homemade pancakes.

Louisiana shrimpers have been taking it on the chin from importers and hurricanes, but you can show your support for our local guys with this year’s king cake purchase. Between now and February 20, Whole Foods stores in Louisiana, Texas, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina will donate $1 from every king cake sold to the White Boot Brigade, a group of shrimpers who use boutique production methods and sell direct to consumers at farmers markets (including ours).

Elsewhere in Carnival Land, I spotted a couple of Poupart’s traditional French king cakes, (simple, unadorned “pies” made of puff pastry and filled with almond paste), at Calandro’s Supermarket on Government. Very exciting and a rare find indeed, although I can’t attest to taste yet since I’d just stuffed myself on blondies filched from my kids’ Valentine’s Day care package when I bumped into them. Poupart’s regular and filled king cakes are there as well and as cheesy as their boxes look, they’re wildly popular and very good.

Blaise’s Taste of Italy items, baked in downtown Independence, have long been in Pocorello’s Casa d’Italia, Calvin’s Bocage Market, both locations of Calandro’s, and Fresina’s Pasta Company (although under a house brand), but it’s taken me eons to finally try them. The humbly packaged liqueur cakes are incredibly moist and delicately flavored with Amaretto, peach brandy or hazelnut and worth buying again. Among Blaise’s cookies – stick with fig. They’re nicely done, but the others are too dry.

And since this week’s blog can’t possibly have enough carbs in it, here’s something for the breakfast-in-bedders. Last weekend, I pulled out my tried-and-true pancake recipe (flour, baking powder, pinch of salt, sugar, milk, and butter), which I do when eggs, bacon and hash browns just aren’t enough. This time, though, I substituted cake flour (one-to-one, although I know that’s breaking the rules). It produced the pancake I was always meant to eat: thin, airy, tender throughout and ever so crispy on the edges.