Best Wedding Cake Flavours: Top Picks for Your Special Day
Selecting the perfect wedding cake, as well as its flavours, is an essential part of wedding planning. It's another opportunity for couples to bake their personal taste into their special day. It will also make sure their celebration ends on a high and delicious note.
Traditional options such as rich fruitcake have stood the test of time, but modern couples in the UK often want something a little different. It’s even possible to order wedding cake sample boxes so you can find the perfect flavour for you.
Let’s take a look at the best wedding cake flavours out there, including the tried and tested traditional flavours, as well as modern flavourings for a not-so-traditional wedding.
Classic Wedding Cake Flavours
When choosing a wedding cake, many couples opt for classic flavours that are widely cherished and easily please a variety of palates. These traditional options have stood the test of time and continue to be one of the cornerstones of wedding celebrations across the UK.
Interestingly, you can now get ‘retro’ cakes that pair tradition with modern styles. Take a look at our retro wedding cake trends blog.
Victoria Sponge
The Victoria Sponge is a quintessential British cake known for its delicate vanilla sponge layers. Typically, it is filled with strawberry or raspberry jam and dusted with icing sugar. Often, the cake is enriched with buttercream, offering a simple yet elegant taste that is beloved at weddings.
Lemon Drizzle
For those who prefer a zesty twist, Lemon Drizzle cake presents a refreshing option. This cake features a zingy lemon-flavoured sponge and is usually complemented with a lemon-infused buttercream or a tangy lemon curd filling.
A light lemon syrup drizzled over the top gives the perfect finish to the cake, making sure it’s full of moisture and giving that extra pop of flavour.
Chocolate Cake
Chocolate cake remains a go-to for its rich and indulgent taste. Varieties, such as a chocolate fudge cake, offer layers of dense chocolate sponge paired with a velvety chocolate buttercream or ganache.
For wedding celebrations, this cake might be adorned with fondant icing or chocolate curls for a sophisticated finish.
Traditional Fruit Cake
No list of classic wedding cake flavours would be complete without the traditional fruit cake. This rich and fruity cake is filled with a variety of dried fruits and often soaked in alcohol, which helps to preserve the cake.
It’s usually covered with marzipan and royal fondant icing, making it a durable and lasting choice for wedding celebrations. The emphasis on lasting a long time had a reason - it wasn’t uncommon for a wedding fruit cake to be kept until the first anniversary or the christening of the first child!
Modern Wedding Cake Flavours
In the realm of wedding cakes, contemporary flavour pairings offer a refreshing departure from traditional tastes. They draw upon a combination of classic and novel ingredients to create a sophisticated and memorable dessert experience - ideal for your special day!
Many brides and grooms who care about sustainable living are also opting for more seasonal flavours, using fresh produce and local ingredients.
Salted Caramel and Chocolate
The sublime union of salted caramel and chocolate creates a rich and mouth-watering experience.
The salted caramel, with its perfect balance of sweet and salty, enhances the deep notes of the chocolate cake sponges and buttercream layers. This cake is often finished with a smooth chocolate ganache. Here at Palms Bakery, it’s one of the most popular wedding cake flavours that couples go for.
Carrot Cake with Pecans
You can’t beat a good carrot! And here at Palms, we make a delicious one.
We’ve updated the carrot cake slightly with the addition of crunchy pecans. This pairing embraces the moist texture of the carrot cake while adding a layer of nutty depth. As you can see on the image, our carrot cake is finished with a cream cheese frosting and edible flowers for that extra special feel.
Chocolate Peanut Butter & Jam
For adventurous palates, there’s the bold combination of chocolate, peanut butter and jam.
This combination brings together the silky texture of chocolate, the saltiness of the peanut butter and the sweetness of the jam. It’s not one for everyone, but for those who likes peanut butter in particular, it’s an absolutely winner!
Lemon & Poppyseed
A classic with a twist. Lemon and poppyseed cakes bring together zesty lemon with the subtle crunch of poppy seeds. It’s a light cake with delicate flavours and fragrances, making it especially ideal for summer weddings.
To add more depth, the lemon and poppyseed can be combined with vanilla or raspberry and white chocolate to make this a truly irresistible wedding cake.
Dessert-Inspired Cakes
Dessert-inspired wedding cakes blend the indulgence of sweet treats with the grandeur of wedding celebrations, with flavours tailored to those who adore classic desserts reinvented in cake form.
Red Velvet
The Red Velvet cake is a sumptuous choice that gives off the flair of sophistication. With its distinct deep red colour, it combines the richness of cocoa with a subtle tang from buttermilk, usually paired with a creamy vanilla or cream cheese frosting.
Sticky Toffee Pudding
The most popular pudding in the UK? We think so.
Translating the comfort of Sticky Toffee Pudding into a wedding cake allows for a moist sponge packed with sweet, finely chopped dates. It’s often drizzled with a rich toffee sauce and can include a layer of buttery toffee frosting.
It’s pure comfort and pure indulgence together.
Banoffee Pie
Banoffee pie-inspired cakes merge the sweetness of bananas with the alluring taste of caramel. Featuring layers of moist banana cake, they're complemented by a luscious filling of caramel or dulce de leche, often finished with whipped cream or a caramel sauce dripping for visual appeal.
Alternative Cakes for Dietary Restrictions
When planning a modern wedding menu, it's important to consider guests with dietary restrictions or preferences.
Vegan wedding cakes have grown in popularity in recent years. Ingredients like butter and eggs can be replaced with high quality vegan friendly ingredients from the likes of almonds, coconuts and plant-based milks, ensuring a delicious experience without compromise.
Couples can also opt for gluten-free wedding cakes. By selecting premium gluten-free flours, they can enjoy classic cake flavours like vanilla and chocolate without the worry of gluten presence.
Tiered Cake Structure and Size
When choosing a wedding cake, couples must consider not only flavours but also the size and structure of the cake, which can range from single-tiered designs to grand multi-tiered masterpieces.
In the realm of wedding planning, going for a multi-tiered wedding cake is a statement of elegance and tradition. Tiered cakes can be made up of layers of different flavoured sponges or layers of all the flavour. Whatever you go for, tiered cakes will be decorated in a consistent finish to bring elegance and style to proceedings. They are a little more expensive of course. Check out our post on wedding cake prices for more information.
For those seeking a modern and understated look, single-tier wedding cakes offer simplicity without sacrificing style or taste. Perfect for smaller weddings or as part of a ‘dessert table’, they allow the couple to focus on a single flavour and design.
Cake makers can craft these cakes to be as lavish or as minimalist as desired. They can also come in different shapes, such as our heart shaped wedding cake, and sizes depending on how many guests are coming.
For more ideas, check out our Wedding Cake Gallery for inspiration . You can also find our process for creating a wedding Cake just for you.
