Moments of Ruth (and Matthew): Concerning wedding cakes...

THE CAKE. A spectacular and fundamental element of any wedding reception. Also the subject of numerous traditions...

First of all, there was 1) the cutting of the cake.

I remember posing for the picture with the knife in hand, and then came the arduous task of breaking through the fondant. The first cut was perfect - Matthew's strength was probably the biggest factor, since when I tried to complete the second cut on my own, crumbs went everywhere - on my face, on my dress, on the floor. In addition to showering the room with crumbs, I had apparently forgotten basic rule no. #1 of cake slicing, which states that your second cut needs to somehow meet up with your first cut in order to create a piece.

After a few more unsuccessful stabs, I attempted to flip out my "piece" with the brilliant method of shoving the cake server under the entire bottom layer and levering it up, a tragic, ill-fated endeavor that only resulted in more crumbs being sprayed on the carpet. At this point the slice I was determined to carve out had been mutilated past recognition, yet still the camera was waiting to take the shot of us feeding each other. The crowd was restless. I began to panic. In the end, I grabbed what I could with my fingers, like a savage, and applied myself to the next rite of passage - 2) the sharing of the first slice.

Plates are for WUSSES

We began the rite of feeding each other, finger-style (though I was so flustered that I probably would have used the cake server if someone had handed it to me). Fortunately for the pictures, the frosting on our cake was hardened, chewy fondant, and our fingers and faces were barely smudged at all. People cheered, I started to relax, and we happily defied that rogue, uncouth custom of smashing the cake in each other's faces (the topic had come up several months preceding our engagement: He was agreeable to whatever I wanted, and I was ADAMANT that NO CAKE WOULD BE SMASHED). P.S. If you're reading this and you happened to have done this at your wedding or you intend to do so at your wedding, no hard feelings. I mean, that's why you're not marrying me, savvy?

So! The cake had been cut and we had eaten a bite. Well, maybe more than a bite. Probably six or seven bites. We were really hungry all during the reception but were so busy being the bride and groom during the 2.5 hours that we were there that we only got to sample a tiny portion of the refreshments on our way out the door (by that point, all the good stuff had already been consumed, naturally). Ah, well; at least I can recreate the food with pictures, right?

Anyway, after scrounging down that piece of cake like two half-starved orphans, we proceeded to take pictures of all the other wedding traditions (garter, bouquet, dancing, hugging our parents and crying like it was our last day on Earth), and we left for our honeymoon. I almost thought it was the last we would see of our gorgeously decorated-to-PERFECTION wedding cake.

But no! When we came back from our honeymoon, we found the top layer of our cake waiting for us. It was so beautiful. And cute. And delicious-smelling. And . . . BIG. It dominated our tiny freezer for a few days, until we decided to break tradition and eat it on our honeymoon, rather than 3) waiting for a year to eat it on our first anniversary. I KNOW. We are such rebels.

But, rather than saving the cake, we saved the pictures, and I now post them, a year later, in honor of our first layer of cake, which was beautiful and tasty enough to deserve to be saved.