Wedding Wednesday And A Birthday

Hello, friends!  It's my birthday today - did you know that?  But it's also Wedding Wednesdays, and there is something that birthdays and weddings share.  I will tell you what it is, if you lean in very close to hear the secret:

Okay, so it's not so much a secret.  Weddings and birthdays both include cake.  Had you guessed that?  You clever things, you.  So, for today's Wedding Wednesday post, let's talk about cake.

I have to admit that I've never imagined having a classic wedding cake.  From anecdotal evidence, it seems like most people don't end up eating cake at weddings, especially not when there's also a plated dessert being served.  So when Jon and I started batting around ideas, I really pushed for a cheese cake.  No, not a cheesecake; a cheese cake.  I wanted stacked wheels of cheese, like these:

[ clockwise from top left: one, two, three, four ]

We wouldn't only have cheese after the meal - because in Europe, unlike in America, the cheese course follows dinner, though the English and the French disagree on whether it appears before or after dessert - but I thought that it would make a delicious savory partner to the dessert bar that I also imagined we might incorporate.  (In this scenario, we wouldn't have a seated/plated dessert at all, but that's a conversation for another post.)

Jon, however, chose this moment to be a staunch traditionalist.  Wedding cake, he said he wanted, and not just any wedding cake: he pictured white and tiers and pillars.  Yes, pillars.  I suppose I should be glad that he didn't insist on fruitcake, which I can't stand but which is, historically, what is served as wedding cake in England.  It took Jon a little while, but he did finally talk me round to the merits of having a classic wedding cake - although I drew the line at pillars.

[ clockwise from top left: one, two, three, four, five ]

To be honest, now that Jon's convinced me that we need a traditional wedding cake, I'm playing with the idea of having lots of cakes on a sideboard - everyone could help themselves throughout the course of the evening, after dinner ends.  But, again, that's a discussion for another post.  For today, we'll stick with some good old-fashioned birthday cake!

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