My fiance and I don’t have a sweet tooth and we don’t like cake, any cake. Do we still need to have a wedding cake? Why do couples cut a cake, anyway?
There are many stories about the evolution of the tradition of newlyweds cutting a wedding cake and they stretch all the way back to ancient Roman days right through to the Middle Ages.
The consensus, however, is the exercise is supposed to help ensure prosperity and good fortune for the newlyweds. How? Apparently, the idea of cutting a wedding cake together is a symbolic one. It’s meant to represent the first joint task of your new life together, one that is witnessed by your nearest and dearest.
While we think it’s a truly lovely gesture, that doesn’t actually mean you must cut a cake – nor that you need even have one. It just means you have to cut
The thing is, it’s a gesture, a symbol of your new unity, so if you like the idea – but don’t want cake, you could do what so many modern newlyweds do, which is ditch the cake and opt for something else, even a cheese wheel, where each ‘tier’ is made up of a different flavour of cheese, surrounded by adornments such as crackers, grapes and quince paste.
It still looks amazing in photos and allows you to have a traditional joint cutting as your first act as newylweds, but it is more perfectly suited to couples with savoury taste buds! Of course, if cheese wheels also aren’t your thing, there are plenty more alternatives to the humble wedding cake!
By opting for a wedding cake alternative you both like, you still get to cut ‘something’ together as your first joint act and you still get one of the must-have wedding photos – but without having to munch on so much as a single crumb of cake!
