The Development of the Wedding Cake . . .

Almost all cultures celebrate special occasions with sweets and weddings are perhaps the best example of this custom. Wedding cakes have a long history, but the elegant traditional tiered wedding cakes we delight in today are far removed from their earliest origins.

A Roman Food Fight

Cakes were an important part of weddings as far back as 2,000 years ago, when Roman wedding cakes more closely resembled loaves of bread. Tradition dictated that the groom break the cake - a symbol of fertility - over his wife’s head to signify his dominance and bring good luck to the couple.
Inventing the layer cake

Medieval wedding cakes were created from small buns brought by each guest as a gift. These buns would be stacked in a pile and sometimes frosted together with sugar. The bride and groom then attempted to kiss over the bun tower and success in doing so signified prosperity for the newlyweds.
Legend has it that the modern croquembouche (a cone-shaped stack of choux pastry balls filled with cream) was invented after a French pâtissier visited medieval England and recreated the traditional tower of cakes with sweet pastry. Famous French pastry chefs Avice and Carême later adapted the recipe using choux pastry to create what we now know as the croquembouche, and today it remains a popular wedding cake alternative throughout Europe.

In England, however, another visiting French chef changed the tradition dramatically during the 17th century by coming up with the idea of a solid stacked cake that avoided the inconvenience of piling the cakes into a mound. This innovation soon developed into the layer cake, a design that quickly caught on with couples.

The Modern Wedding Cake and its Traditions

Prepared days in advance, early wedding cakes were covered in lard to ensure they remained moist. Initially the lard was removed before being served, but later it was mixed with sugar and left on top of the cake as a form of icing.

In the Victorian era, white cakes symbolised the purity of the bride, but prior to this, wedding cakes were also coloured white to signify wealth, as perfectly white icing was only achieved by using the finest, most expensive, refined sugar.

Although the cutting of the cake now represents the first joint act of a couple newlyweds, previously the bride cut the cake and handed slices to the groom’s family. This act represented the transfer of her duties from her father’s household to her husband’s. This tradition ended when the development of multi-tiered cakes led to more solid icing that required the strength of both the bride and the groom to cut through it.

The development of multi-tiered wedding cakes is attributed to Thomas Rich, a baker’s apprentice during the 18th century who fell in love with his boss’s daughter. On their wedding day, Rich surprised his bride with a wedding cake inspired by the tiered steeple of St. Bride’s Church in London. This cake marked the invention of the tiered wedding cake, and Rich made his fortune selling edible creations modelled on the church for the rest of his life.