Having a Wedding Cake is a very old tradition which still forms the focal point at the reception, where it is displayed to the very best advantage.
  There are many styles to choose from today and the most popular is the three tiered cake with personalised decorations and colours to match or blend in with the colours chosen by the Bride and Groom. This shape is based on the shape of the spire of St Brides Church in London. The iced and tiered cake was brought to Britain from France after the Restoration in 1660. The idea where the tiers are placed directly one on top of the other is gaining in popularity and both types are generally displayed in specialist cake shops for you to make a final choice.
  They can be made with the rich fruit traditional mixture, plain sponge or chocolate sponge and decorated according to the bride and groom's choice. The idea of having many small cakes placed carefully in layers is gaining in popularity as an alternative. It would be easy to distribute the cakes to the guests that way!

 



 



The cake is a custom which still occurs in many different cultures and during Roman times for those of the upper classes, a cake made of flour, salt and water was used during the ceremony. It was first tasted by both the bride and the groom and then the remainder would be thrown over the head of the bride. This was thought to bring a life of plenty and fertility to the pair. The guests would try and obtain a crumb for themselves for they believed they would then share in the good fortune and future prosperity of the couple.
  It was only the children born to the couple whose marriage had been celebrated this way, that could qualify for high office in Roman culture. Not only did the cake give good fortune to the couple, it insured a prosperous future for their as yet unborn children.   In ancient times the guests would bring their own small cakes to the ceremony and then threw them at the newly wedded couple, probably as a relic of fertility rites, once performed. Later the guests would crumble the cakes over the bride’s head. It was thought that a crumb, taken by a maiden and placed under her pillow that night, would result in a dream showing the man she would marry.
  In Victorian times it was traditional for unmarried girls to pass a piece of cake through the wedding ring of the new bride, sleep with it under her pillow and she too would dream of the man she would eventually marry. An old UK custom used to be practised extensively, was for a ring to be baked inside the cake. The lucky guest who found the ring in their piece of cake, would be the next one to find love, happiness and good fortune.



 



Cutting the cake is a very important part of the reception and is traditional for both the bride and groom to cut the cake together, symbolising the joining of their lives. The groom places his right hand over the right hand of his new bride, she then places her left hand on top and carefully, together they make the first cut as a symbol of their union.   The cake is traditionally made of fruit and decorated with icing. The rich fruit and spices in the cake make it keep longer than a sponge cake and as it usual to send out portions of the cake to guests who were unable to attend the ceremony, as a way of including them in the celebrations. It is usual to keep the top tier of the cake, ready to celebrate the christening of their first child, so ensuring another enduring tradition. Alternatively, the top tier can be saved for the first Wedding Anniversary.

 



 



The cake is served together with a glass of champagne at the reception, after the meal, when the "toasts" commence.   Toasts originate from the sixteenth centuary when a small morsel of bread was put into a goblet of wine which would then be passed from guest to guest until it was finished and the person left had to drink the final drop and eat the crumbs left in the goblet. Nowadays we have the champagne toasts and the best man is usually the first one to make a toast. He then has to make his speech telling tales about the groom and hopefully making the guests laugh a little before thanking the bridesmaids and finally the Bride and Groom.