Cake alternatives

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Inlighten Photography Decorate your cupcake tower with fresh flowers

If you’re the kinda girl who likes to break the rules – getting down on one knee to propose to your hubby or matching your red handbag with your hot pink pumps – simply forget tradition and opt for something a little different.

Mini wedding cakes

Mini wedding cakes have many talents.

Serve them in lieu of a large wedding cake that has to be cut up and served.
Order them in addition to a cake (and in the exact same style – cute!).
Give them to your guests as bombonniere.

Some ideas for your miniature wedding cakes:

Decorate them using the main motif of your wedding cake such as a daisy, cherub or sugar rose.
They can be a plain cake decorated with colourful ornaments.
Wrap your baby cakes in a coloured ribbon that matches your wedding dress.
Tie them with iced ropes in gold or silver for a shimmering effect.
Have a tiered miniature cake that replicates your actual wedding cake!

Mini-cakes can be made of fudge giving them a longer shelf life, so go to town and make these mini masterpieces a work of art for your guests to admire during and after the wedding.

Dessert cupcakes

Cute, affordable and practical, dessert cupcakes are taking the stage as the prefect accompaniment to a stand-up reception.

They can be made in any number of different flavours – traditional fruitcake, chocolate mud, carrot, jaffa, whatever you prefer.
They will be stacked beautifully onto a decorated stand.
Place a centrepiece at the top of the stand such as figurines or flowers.
Your guests may take them at their leisure, cruising past from the dance floor at any time of the night, and picking them up for a taste – yum!

If you decide to go with tiers of fancy individual cakes, you might like to consider putting a larger cake on the top tier so that you can still cut the cake with your new husband.

Croquembouche

For something totally different why not have a dessert you have to crack with a hammer before you can eat it?
Croquembouche is a traditional French dessert made by stacking cream puffs in a conical shape and sticking them together with toffee or caramel. It’s been part of every sophisticated French event for hundreds of years and can add something extra to your wedding.
It’s basically constructed from a tower of profiteroles or pastry puffs made of a special type of pastry called choux pastry. It can then be stuffed with anything sweet but normally mascarpone crème or vanilla crème. It’s then drizzled with toffee or caramel to hold it all together.
The custom is that the bride and groom have to hit it with a hammer or sword – so get cracking