Wedding Cake, Bride/Groom Cake, Dream Cake

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WEDDING CAKE--OED has 1648
BRIDECAKE--OED has 1552
GROOM CAKE--no entry in OED or DARE
DREAM CAKE--DARE has 1912

   Actually, I just want to know what the deal is with that little "bride-and-groom" wedding cake decoration.

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THAT LITTLE "BRIDE-AND-GROOM" WEDDING CAKE DECORATION

   There's not a word for it so it won't make the dictionaries, but the OXFORD ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN FOOD AND DRINK should have it.  The cutesy thing goes back to at least 1919.


  News of Food; Different Sorts of Wedding Receptions Described at Ascending Cost Levels ; By JANE NICKERSON; New York Times (1857-Current file), New York, N.Y.; Apr 21, 1948; pg. 32, 1 pgs
("So far as fashions in cakes go, Mrs. Gottlieb thinks the bride-and-groom decoration is passing in favor of wedding bells or spun sugar roses or, as is sometimes requested, fresh flowers.")

  WEDDING CAKES ARE IN SEASON; New York Times (1857-Current file), New York, N.Y.; Jun 8, 1941; pg. SM21, 1 pgs
("Also, in the last few years, fewer and fewer cakes are turning up with little bride and groom figures standing under a paper arbor.  This is a great relief to purists.  The groom, they insist, has no place on a wedding cake.  It is strictly the bride's affair.")

  WARTIME FICTION BY; Problem of Life After Death the Theme Of "Mrs. Marden"--Latest Novels and Short Stories by Joseph Hergesheimer, Mary S. Andrews, W.E. Morris and Others LATEST WORKS OF FICTION JOY IN THE MORNING LINDA CONDON; New York Times, New York, N.Y.; Nov 9, 1919; pg. BR1, 6 pgs
(The novel BELIEVE YOU ME by Nina Wilcox Putnam is mentioned for its "American dialect," and I'll have to read it.  It has this excerpt: "It looked like the powdered-sugar industry was going to suffer because about all the plaster in the country seemed to be being used on arches which looked like dago-wedding cakes and you actually missed the dolls dressed up like brides and grooms off the top of them.")

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DREAM CAKE

  Some selected cites are below.  DARE has a 1912 "dream cake."  The 1899 "dream cake" here is not wedding cake, but that idea goes back at least to the beginning of the BROOKLYN EAGLE in the 1840s.


(BROOKLYN DAILY EAGLE)
   25 March 1845, BROOKLYN DAILY EAGLE, pg. 2:
   A piece of wedding cake wrapped in it, and it is kissed by the rosy lips of a lovely maiden, and placed under her pillow as a spell to conjure up in her dreams a handsome lover, a fine estate, and a moderate quantity of responsibilities.

   5 March 1846, BROOKLYN DAILY EAGLE, pg. 2:
   Such lots of wedding cake as we've received during the last week you never _did_ see! (...) Who wants some to dream on?  We'll warrant pleasant dreams over such cake.

   10 December 1850, BROOKLYN DAILY EAGLE, pg. 2:
_Dreaming on Wedding Cake._

   22 April 1899, BROOKLYN DAILY EAGLE, pg. 2:
   _DREAM CAKE._
_A Cook Discovered an Excellent Recipe in Her Sleep._
   I have noticed in the papers the announcement of the death of "the man who invented angel-cake."  He made a fortune out of this and other confections, but it didn't do him any good, for he was a miser.  I do not care much for "angel-cake" or its invention, but I can tell a singular and perfectly true story about another kind of cake which figures among the choice recipes in some of the cookery books under the title of "Ida's Dream Cake."  A young married woman dreamed one night, quite a number of years ago, that she was cooking a cake.
(From the BOSTON TRANSCRIPT--ed.)


(PROQUEST HISTORICAL NEWSPAPERS)
  Wedding Cakes To Dream On; By JANE NICKERSON; New York Times (1857-Current file), New York, N.Y.; May 15, 1955; pg. SM50, 1 pgs

  DO FRENCH ACTRESSES SET THE FASHIONS; The Narrow Skirt Is Doomed, as Good Sense Is All Against Its Further Use by Fastidious Women.; -- By REDFERN, BY M. REDFERN.; New York Times (1857-Current file), New York, N.Y.; Mar 24, 1912; pg. X10, 1 pgs
("Every one knows that to dream with a piece of wedding cake under the pillow is portentous, and therefore, perhaps, the reason that a piece of wedding cake is given to each guest to carry with him.")

  DREAMING ON WEDDING CAKE; The Modern Way, Which Seems to Make Marriage More Than Ever a Lottery.; The Washington Post (1877-1954), Washington, D.C.; Jun 13, 1909; pg. TM4, 1 pgs

  THE DREAMERS' CLUB.; The Washington Post (1877-1954), Washington, D.C.; Mar 25, 1895; pg. 4, 1 pgs

  The Hero a Good Fellow.; MR. JERVIS. By B.M. Croker. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Company.; New York Times (1857-Current file), New York, N.Y.; Dec 26, 1894; pg. 3, 1 pgs

  OLD-TIME WEDDING LORE; HOW PAST GENERATIONS HAVE CELEBRATED MARRIAGES.; New York Times (1857-Current file), New York, N.Y.; Apr 8, 1894; pg. 18, 1 pgs

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GROOM('S) CAKE

   There are fewer than ten hits before 1960 on ProQuest Historical Newspapers.  No wonder OED and DARE don't have it.
   The first hit of "bride and groom cake" might not apply.


  Bridal Feast Gains Favor in D.C. Weddings; For Nuptials at Noon, Menu Includes Soup, an Entree, Salad, Ice Cream.; By Jean Green.; The Washington Post (1877-1954), Washington, D.C.; Jun 5, 1938; pg. S9, 1 pgs
("One shop features a wedding cake with a groom's cake on top.  This top layer is a fruitcake and is to be removed before the cake is cut.  The custom dictates putting the fruitcake in a tinbox to age and then having it cut on the first wedding anniversary by the groom.")

  Display Ad 4 -- No Title; The Washington Post (1877-1954), Washington, D.C.; Apr 19, 1937; pg. 5, 1 pgs

  Display Ad 4 -- No Title; The Washington Post (1877-1954), Washington, D.C.; Apr 22, 1936; pg. 5, 1 pgs

  WINIFRED BLACK WRITES ABOUT Jilted at the Altar; Four In One Family.; The Washington Post (1877-1954), Washington, D.C.; Jul 1, 1922; pg. 10, 1 pgs

  BRIDE'S CAKE AND GROOM'S CAKE; With general directions for cake-making; Christian Science Monitor (1908-Current file), Boston, Mass.; May 13, 1913; pg. 6, 1 pgs

  USEFUL FAMILY HINTS.; New York Times (1857-Current file), New York, N.Y.; Nov 11, 1877; pg. 9, 1 pgs
("The table is set the same as for other weddings: always have the usual bride and groom cake, everything tastefully trimmed with white, and having a wedding appearance.")