A wedding cake is customarily served to guests following the wedding ceremony. It is traditionally large, and comes tiered or multi-layered. The wedding cake is heavily adorned, generally with icing over a coating of marzipan, with the figures of the bride and groom on top. Other commonly used designs include horseshoes(which stand for good luck), gold rings and doves. The ideal wedding cake has to be strong enough to support the decorations; at the same time it has to be fit for consumption.

Customarily, the cake is first cut by the newlyweds together, usually with a knife or, in some cases, even a sword. Then the newlyweds feed a portion of the cake to each other. Guests may then indulge in the cake. An old tradition required the bride to serve the cake to the groom's family, a symbolic gesture of transferring herself from her family to the groom's.

The wedding cake's origins are not easily determined. Today, wedding cakes are generally served at Christian or Western ceremonies. Sweets are used as an alternative in other cultures. Olden Roman records talk of sweets given out during wedding receptions. Another popular Roman practice was to drop the cake on the bride's head.

A substantially large cake, a requisite during ancient times, took quite a lot of time to make. The high content of sugar can thus be explained. A heavy sugar frosting could stop the cake from being spoiled by moisture. Also, sugar combined with fat would satisfy the consumption of the large number of people liable to be present at the ceremony.

It is noteworthy that King Henry VIII of England actually came up with a law to limit the quantity of sugar on a wedding cake. During World War II, the icing on the wedding cake could not be produced, as sugar was heavily taxed. Thus, there was a marked reduction in the size of the wedding cake. Cakes were generally served in a box adorned with plaster of Paris, to give the illusory feel of a bigger, more conventional cake.

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