The wedding cake is much more than a simple dessert but a true symbol of good luck for newlyweds who have decided to unite their lives with marriage. Its origins are very ancient and ancestral. The first traces of wedding cakes date back toAncient Greecewhere simple doughs were prepared from flour, honey and sesame seeds. These ingredients were considered symbols of fertility, luck and prosperity.
At the time of Ancient Romeinstead, honey was mixed with fruit and flour to create rustic sweets that were crumbled on the bride’s head as a wish for abundance. The wedding ceremony itself among the ancient Romans took place thanks to a food, a spelt focaccia, which could be either salty or sweet, which was broken together by the spouses. This rite was called “confarreatio“.
In the Middle Ages, particularly in England after the Hundred Years’ War, the tradition of stacking sweets on top of each other to form a mound arose.
This custom developed over time, leading to the creation of the first layered cakes, very popular among the nobility and the wealthier classes. These cakes were often decorated with white icing, a symbol of purity and virginity, elements considered fundamental in aristocratic weddings.
During the Renaissance and soon after, between the 16th and 17th centuries, wedding cakes were often savoury and included ingredients such as eggs, dried fruit, oysters and pine nuts. A 1685 recipe by Robert May even included lamb’s testicles and rooster’s combs, which were thought to boost a couple’s fertility. During this period, it became common in England to serve two separate cakes: one for the bride, usually covered in white icing, symbolising her virginal status, and one for the groom, which was smaller and darker.
In 19th century France, master pastry chef Marie-Antoine Carême created the croquembouchea wedding cake favorite consisting of cream-filled balls stacked in a cone shape. Around the same time, it became common to include a ring in the slice intended for the bride and groom, as a sign of union and happiness. Royal icing, a white frosting that characterizes many modern wedding cakes, takes its name from the cake served at the wedding of Queen Victoria, the queen of England (and many other realms), on February 10, 1840. The enormous cake measured three meters in diameter and weighed over 140 kilos.
In the 20th century, white wedding cakes also became popular in Italy and France. In Spain, the English cake was imitated as early as 1906, on the occasion of the wedding between King Alfonso XIII of Bourbon and the British Princess Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg, granddaughter of the Queen of England. The trend had been launched and remained in vogue until today, spreading not only among the nobility but also among the bourgeois class.
Today wedding cakes are prepared in many ways, with sugar paste decorations, fresh flowers, aromatic herbs and toppers that represent the bride and groom. The only limit is the pastry chef’s imagination, the requests of the future spouses and, obviously, the price you are willing to pay for such an important dessert. In fact, it ranges from 2/300 euros for the simplest and smallest cakes for weddings with few guests up to astronomical figures for crowded and luxurious weddings.
As fundamental as the dessert itself is the cutting the first slice on the part of the spouses.
Tradition dictates that it is performed by simultaneously joining hands and grasping the knife together. A toast will then follow where all the guests will wish the couple the best.
A thousand-year-old tradition that continues to carry with it a strong symbolic charge and to arouse strong and pleasant emotions.