A Big Piece of Wedding Cake

Yesterday and Today

By Karen Sturtevant

Commemorating a milestone, whether birthday, anniversary, or promotion isn’t complete without a cake. Cup, layered, or mini, cakes are synonymous with celebration.

Photo [above] courtesy of New England Culinary Institute (NECI)

Modern day wedding cakes run the gamut of classic to comic

Swirls of piping, rich buttercream frosting, and fondant pearls dotted on a multitiered cake may be what we expect to see displayed at a wedding reception, but in day’s past, a loaf of bread and pile of biscuits sufficed for the celebratory sweet. Modern day wedding cakes run the gamut of classic to comic and have evolved from very humble beginnings. Over 1,000 years ago, a wedding was celebrated with the groom eating part of a loaf of barley bread and then breaking the other half over his bride’s head. Symbolically, this action was a sign of good fortune, a blessing of many children, breaking the virginal state, and becoming submissive to the groom. As the bread crumbled, the single women would scramble to gather the crumbs as having the good fortune to acquire these crumbs was thought to ensure a future marriage. Cakes as we now know them didn’t enter the wedding picture until the nineteenth century.

Cake above (1) Sweet Crunch Bakeshop and Catering Co
Cake above (2) Gourmet Provence

Bride's Pie

In medieval England, simple flour based unsweetened biscuits or scones (provided by guests) would be piled high––a prelude to today’s cake toppers. If the couple could kiss over the top, good luck, prosperity, happiness, and many children would follow (or so it was believed).

First appearing in the seventeenth century and lasting for the next 200 years was a common dish called the bride’s pie: a meat pie with sweet bread, mincemeat, or mutton with the secret ingredient being a glass ring.

The adage states that the woman to find the coveted prize would be next to wed. Early British bride’s pies included mixed cockscomb, lamb testicles, sweet bread, and thankfully, a mixture of spices.

Plum Cakes

By the nineteenth century single tiered plum cakes gained popularity replacing the bride’s pie. Sugar coated with white icing, plum cakes were reserved only for the wealthy and graced the tables of the affluent symbolizing the family’s position in social circles. Before the Victorian era, ingredients were difficult, if not impossible to acquire for cake making, particularly those required for icing. White icing required the use of the finest refined sugar. The whiter the cake, the more affluent the family appeared. For the more modest, the bride’s pie remained a mainstay. The plum cake stayed the cake until the late nineteenth century when multitiered cakes began their rise in history.

British royalty were the first to introduce multitiered confections. Upper layers were made from spun sugar with pillars used for reinforcement. To prevent the pillars from sinking into the bottom tiers, the icing was hardened providing the necessary support. From the early twentieth century to modern times, wedding cakes have evolved into sumptuous confections while honoring representation and tradition.

Cake (4) above by Snaffle Sweets
Cake (5) by Delicate Decadence Cake Boutique

Cutting the cake became the very first task that the newlyweds performed as a married couple.

With the groom ‘helping,’ the first piece would be cut and fed to the bride while simultaneously the bride offered her piece to her new husband. Filled with symbolism, the act is thought to show commitment of providing for one another.

Baking tiny silver charms attached to ribbons in the cake became a custom in the Victorian era. If a woman were lucky to find this treasure in her piece of cake, she would pull the satin ribbon and read her future based on the charm. She hoped for a butterfly (eternal beauty) or a kite (a fun and leisurely life). A red bean signified good luck while pulling out a thimble meant a life of spinsterhood. This custom is still practiced in the southern United States with the charms being fashioned from gold, silver, or crystal.

While the bride’s cake was traditionally white, the groom’s cake, to contrast, was darker (usually chocolate or mousse). The groom would serve pieces to the bridesmaids or save for after the honeymoon and share with friends. Modern day grooms choose to have their cake reflect their hobbies, sports teams, favorite muscle cars, or affiliations.

The Royals are experts on all matters in protocol, manners, and festivities both grand and every day––weddings and wedding cakes are no exceptions. On November 20, 1947, then Princess Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) wed Price Phillip of Greece (later Duke of Edinburgh).

500 Pound Cake

With nine cakes, the grandest was nine-feet tall weighing 500 pounds, with four tiers. Three of the tiers were sugar replications of Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle, and Balmoral Castle.

To this day, a piece of wedding cake from 1840 wedding of Alexandrina Victoria (later Queen Victoria) to Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha is on display at Windsor Castle.

Cake (6) Juniors Bakery
Cake (7) Bakearia

Five Foot Tall Wedding Cake

The June 21, 1982, wedding cake of Charles, Prince of Wales and Lady Diana (later Diana, Princess of Wales), which included bananas, apples, coconuts and pineapples, was five feet tall and adorned with marzipan Windsor Coat of Arms. Two cakes were made in case of accidents and took 14 weeks to complete. Diana was only 19 when she met with the baker to create the cake and 13 months later at Prince William’s christening, a tier was used in celebration.

William, Prince of Wales and Catherine Middleton’s April 29, 2011, wedding had been on the radar for British and Royal watchers worldwide. Kate took the lead in designing the fruit cake masterpiece and requested replications of 16 flowers and foliage, each bearing a symbolic meaning––a custom from the Victorian era. With detailed piping and intricate scrollwork of cream and white, the multitiered creation was made with French brandy soaked fruits of dried raisins, walnuts, graded orange, and cherries. Prince William, not to be outdone, chose one of his favorite childhood tastes for the groom’s confection: chocolate biscuit cake made from a family recipe.

Wedding cakes choices, from the shapes, flavors, and icings are unlimited. With television shows featuring the wildest and most elaborate cakes ever seen, couples are opting for nontraditional shapes in hexagon, octagon or mini cakes. Mini cakes, with their intricate details, can be made in different flavors and fillings to please every guest. Modern celebrations are featuring cakes of square over round and stepped over tiered.

The sweet topping of icing, for some, is the favorite part of the cake. Buttercream frosting is the traditional choice and used in a variety of designs.
Fondant, a shimmery option, is used to make intricate and beautiful accents. Made from crushed almonds, eggs and sugar, marzipan looks like fondant and is best used in the creation of detailed flowers, seashells, and fancy embellishments.

Cake flavors range from vanilla, chocolate, coconut, mango, amaretto or lemon. Waves of strawberries or raspberries through cheesecakes are a favorite and special treat.
Fillings of cream, mousse, or custard are the scrumptious glue that keep the layers together. In the search for your baker, ask for their suggestions and prepare yourself to be amazed at the plethora of choices.

Cake and pastry bakers will often source local ingredients of eggs, flours, roots, spices, and dairy to give their handmade confections an extra special touch. Knowing that fresh, around-the-corner ingredients were used in the preparation makes the cake even sweeter.

As weddings have become as much spectacle as splendor, the cake has become a focal point to reflects couples’ wishes. Whether topped with a decadent white chocolate hazelnut mousse or a quilted pattern of icing, wedding cakes are centerpieces of prominence. Long forgotten are the broken loaves of breads over brides’ heads. Sophisticated black and white to whimsy pastel and polka dots, today’s wedding cakes are crafted culinary creations as much a feast for the eyes as the palate.

Related: Be sure to read our online And Now For The Cake with tips and anecdotes about amazing wedding cakes. "...if you want to get the perfect cake for the perfect day, you’ll need to plan ahead."

Also read "Do's and Don't of Cake Cutting" - Tips for your moment before te cake when everyone is watching and the cameras are clicking

Karen Sturtevant

Karen Sturtevant is a freelance writer, editor of Vermont Bride, and considers chocolate cake her favorite food group.

Photo by Larry Asam Photography

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