Brace yourself at your Lake Tahoe wedding for endless questions regarding two things: your dress and your cake.
But just when you think you can’t spend another minute talking about how you chose the flavor, style and baker, wow your guests with these fun facts about wedding cakes.
- Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip’s cake in 1947, that they cut with his sword, was four-tiered, nine feet tall, and weighed 500 lb.
- Prince Edward and his bride’s Devil’s Food cake in 1999 was seven-tiered, 10 feet tall, took 515 hours to make, and was topped with tennis rackets to symbolize where the couple first met.
- Cake, a bakery in Chester, England, made the world’s most costly cake in March 2013, coming in at $52.7…MILLION. The eight-tiered cake showcased 4,000 diamonds.
- White icing symbolizes purity and wealth. When Queen Victoria married Prince Albert, the white icing became known as “royal icing,” and was made stiff (of egg whites, sugar and lemon juice) so it could hold sugar paste models without causing the cake to collapse.
- The most expensive slice (yes, slice!) of wedding cake sold went for $29,900 in 1998. It was from the Duke and Duchess of Windsor’s 1937 wedding cake.
- In Roman times, before cake became the standard, the bride and groom would get a loaf of barley bread that the groom would break over his bride’s head to symbolize dominance and fertility.
- Wedding cake toppers only became a thing in the ’50s, and represented a couple’s bond.
- Tiered wedding cakes dates back to medieval times and started with piles of bread. Guests would pile up scones, biscuits and other bready things, and the bride and groom would have to kiss over them without causing to pile to topple. If they were successful, they were guaranteed prosperity.
- After the bread pile came the “bride’s pie.” Cakes didn’t start getting introduced until the early 19th century.
- The first sweet wedding cakes were the Banbury cake, a flat, spiced pastry filled with currents.
- The world’s largest wedding cake weighed 15,032 lb., and was made by chefs at the Mohegan Sun Hotel and Casino in Connecticut.