The wedding cake is certainly an important element of any wedding. After all, your guests will be fixated on it when you both cut the first slice, and your photographer will no doubt be immortalising that moment in a photo which takes pride of place in any wedding album.

Plus, with guests taking a slice, it also needs to taste good!

But what to choose? There is of course the traditional tiered wedding cake in flavours of your choosing, but there are plenty of other great alternatives if you’re looking for something different which stands out ahead of the rest. Here are a few of our favourites:

Naked wedding cake

This rustic looking cake has gained popularity in recent years. Simply put, it’s an ordinary layered cake but without the outer layer of icing. This allows everything within the cake to be laid bare, such as the different sponge layers and fillings.

When it’s done right, it certainly looks great. Different colours of sponge with cream or jam layers can create a beautiful aesthetic quality which looks unlike any normal wedding cake but still tastes divine.

Unique flavours and fillings

Perhaps you prefer the traditional wedding cake draped with a smooth layer of crisp-white icing, but would still like to mix it up to offer something more unique. How about unusual flavours and fillings? Some options include:

  • Carrot cake
  • Cheesecake (with a biscuit base)
  • Cake made with pink champagne (or other types of alcohol)
  • Tea or coffee flavours
  • Nuts, seeds or uncommon fruit combinations

With a tiered cake, you can opt for multiple different flavours, so there will be something that everyone can enjoy.

Cupcakes

Why have one big cake when you can have dozens of smaller cakes? Many newlyweds now do away with the normal wedding cake altogether, and instead have a huge range of cupcakes for guests to choose from. You can even create a cupcake tower on a tiered rack to pay homage to the traditional wedding cake style.

Mini desserts

If you want to go with the bite-sized edibles, there are many more options to choose from than just cupcakes. You can mix-and-match things like mini cheesecakes, dessert shots, macarons, scones, cookies, éclairs and much more.

or for something even more unique…

Cheese celebration cake

Everyone loves cheese, right? This 3 tier cheese tower, weighing in at just under a whopping 10kg, contains 5 different premium cheeses, including Gould’s cheddar, farmhouse double Gloucester, farmhouse red Leicester, Rave’s Oak goat’s cheese and Blacksticks blue cheese.

It provides around 100 portions, and when paired with fruit and crackers, would definitely be a popular addition to any wedding buffet.

Pork pie cake

This tiered tower consists of 3 jumbo-sized luxury pork pies at just over 4kg, and serves around 30 portions. Combine it with some chutney, and you just know this would be gobbled up in the blink of an eye!

The brave amongst you might consider one of these as a direct replacement for a traditional wedding cake. However, they do make fantastic buffet options to go alongside a normal dessert cake which are sure go down very well with guests.