WHOSE WEDDING CAKE IS IT, ANYWAY?

For those of you who don’t know me, my name is Brooke Empting, and this summer I have been given opportunity of interning with Andria. With this position comes the wonderful task of coming up with my own blog series. I love cake. I can't eat cake. So, I write about cake. Today I will be discussing wedding cake traditions, and how they have changed over time.

The wedding cake has been an important part of the wedding celebration since Roman times. At the end of the ceremony, a thin wheat cake, representing bounty, was crumbled over the bride's head to ensure her fertility. Thankfully, the bride no longer ends up with cake on her head, just smashed in her face. One of the cake traditions that has developed over time is the bride and groom feeding the first piece of cake to each other. In most cases, one if not both of them will end up smashing the cake in the other ones face. This taste of the first slice serves as a symbol of the bride and groom's willingness to share a household.

 Another wedding cake tradition is to have the top layer of the cake made out of fruit cake, since it can be kept for long periods of time. This layer is saved and frozen for the bride and groom to eat on their first anniversary. Many couples do this, but it doesn't usually taste very good a year later. But really, who cares? It’s tradition.

Putting a piece of the bride's cake under a single person's pillow is said to lead to "dreams of a future spouse", according to tradition. So, if saving the top layer of the cake is not for you, or you do not want to eat year-old cake, you could have the caterer pack slices in cute little boxes to send home with guests with small paper inserts describing the tradition. The inserts will allow people who are not aware of the tradition, which is probably most people, to understand why they are getting an extra piece of cake.

Now, where's my fork?

Tell me, what are your favorite wedding traditions?

Photo origin unkown