Wedding cakes and the general rules to follow
Wedding cakes have been a central part of wedding ceremonies in Britain since the
days of the Roman Empire, although in those early days they were more savoury than sweet, and consisted of hard, flat discs which symbolised fertility. As part of the celebrations, the 'bride's cake', as it was called, was broken over the head of the bride (this tradition has happily since been discarded: possibly the roman hairdressers got pretty sick of their intricately plaited and garlanded hairdos ending up full of broken bits of baked wheat and barley).
The design of the traditional wedding cake has varied hugely over the centuries: some time in the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries it became fashionable to pile several cakes one on top of the other into a tower. The happy couple then had to kiss over the top of the pile without knocking it over: a successful kiss was a good omen, portending a long life of happiness and prosperity for the newlyweds (whether this worked, of course, we have no record - I think I'd cheated and made sure the cakes were stuck immovably to the table).
In the seventeenth century the story goes that a French chef, on a trip to London, watched a cake piling wedding and was dismayed at the ease at which they tumbled over. He went back to France and worked on creating the firmly iced robust tiered wedding cake that we know today.
In Victorian and Edwardian times wedding cakes became incredibly ornate and magnificent: royal weddings set the benchmarks, and chefs outdid themselves in creating multi-tiered, elaborate structures covered in sugar birds, flowers, butterflies and lace. Today, cakes are still are an integral part of all important celebrations - especially weddings - but can be as formal or informal as desired, from traditional, classic tiers to piles of pretty cup cakes or sugar reproductions of the couple's cats or dogs. Fillings can be made from fruit, sponge or chocolate cake - couples often choosing to have one tier of each.
The wedding cake is far more than just the final course of the wedding meal: it's a symbol of good fortune and of the ceremonial aspect of the day, and the holding of the knife and cutting the first slice together symbolises the way that the couple will live and work happily together throughout their marriage.
Wedding cakes and the general rules to follow
By: Gareth Hoyle
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