While wedding cakes are an iconic part of a wedding, couples are breaking tradition by serving alternative dessert options for their big celebration.
Not a sweet tooth or just not a cake fan? There’s still plenty of ways to serve a crowd-pleasing dessert without serving an actual cake. Particularly over the last few years, the wedding industry has seen a rise in couples using alternatives such as cupcakes macarons, doughnuts and even wheels of cheese.
Using smaller sized desserts have proven to be a great way to ensure desserts can also be taken home if not eaten. So often, by the time the cake is cut many slices sit lonely on serving plates on the tables while your guests dance the night away and never get eaten. Having an option like a cheese wheel (with accompanying charcuterie or antipasti) a grazing table of smaller sized sweets or boxing up treats as bonbonniere has been more popular too.
Some couples also opt to give a nod to their heritage by opting for something like a French croquembouche (a towering dessert made of choux puff pastry and filled with crème pâtissière) or Italian cannoli. Whatever is meaningful to your spouse, makes your celebration that much more personal.
From brownies, waffle towers, ice cream food trucks and everything in between, the options are endless. Get creative, make your choice reflective of you as a couple and enjoy.
Cupcakes can be a great alternative to a traditional wedding cake.
Need ideas for alternatives? Why not try the following ideas:
Cupcakes.
Stacking cupcakes on a tiered platter looks great and is a great option for guests bonbonniere as you can provide small boxes for them to take their treat home.
Cake pops.
A great choice if you want something portable and they can also be made to match any colour scheme, so they’re an easy addition to a dessert table too.
Image: Victoria Priessnitz
Doughnuts.
Guests go nuts for doughnuts. Whether they’re frosted, jam-filled or decorated beautifully like the ones pictured, you can stack these sweets and decorate with flowers, add them to a dessert grazing table or (assuming the toppings will stay on) create a doughnut wall for a bit of fun.
Image: Brooke Lark.
Cheese.
No sweet tooth? No worries. Opt for stacked cheese wheels to create a tiered beauty and pair it with all the right accompaniments.
Macarons.
Adding a variety of colourful macarons is a simple and unexpected idea. It also easily pairs with a smaller cake to have the best of both worlds.
Image: Victoria Priessnitz.
Grazing sweets and lolly bars.
Why not all of the above? Create a mix of lollies where guests can bag up a goody bag and nobble on it later or graze a table of sweet treats and mini desserts so no matter what their tastes, there’ll be something for everyone. Deck out a table filled with your favourite candies, cookies, mini cakes, fruits and everything in between to satisfy every sweet tooth.
