Wedding Cakes .... Made Of Cheese

Anyone who has dined with me knows when the dessert menu is handed around after dinner, I skip something sweet and go for a savoury cheese course ...... and usually another glass of wine to go with it!

At most of the dinner parties we've hosted there has been a cheese course on the menu, my favourites are baked brie with garlic and rosemary and mini brie cold smoked with apple and served with home made rosemary bread croutons.

So when the decision came for what type of wedding cake to have I knew I didn't want to go with a traditional iced sweet cake. 

I have noticed too often at weddings once everyone has eaten dinner and dessert and the drinks are flowing and the dance floors pumping, people no longer feel like eating something sweet and the beautiful cake on display is only enjoyed by some.

I don't know what happens to the rest of the cake whether it lives on in newlyweds freezers or if the venue staff have a cake party. All I know is it's a crying shame to see such a beautiful, tasty, not to mention very expensive, wedding cake not get eaten.

So while I'm all for savory, Mr P on the other hand is the worlds biggest sweet tooth!

But as we already have three different desserts being served as part of our cocktail menu at the wedding reception it was a logical choice to go for something not so sweet ,,,,, like a cheese course.

Once I had convinced Mr P that we needed a cake of cheese my next hurdle was my parents!

It took a while to explain to my Dad there would be no fruit cake, or mud cake, or any other cake and that the cheese would not be covered in icing, it would just be big round wheels of cheese! Once he understood the concept of a cake made of cheese it was full steam ahead and being a cheese lover too he is now all for the idea! My Mum absolutely loves the idea and has been helping by visiting cheese makers to taste test cheeses that go together and is also going to decorate the cake for us.

My savoury cheese loving ways have for a very long time admired the beautiful images I'd seen on Pinterest of cakes made of cheese. 

Decorated with rustic leaves and fresh fruits they look stunning and can be dressed up to look just as fancy as a traditional wedding cake.

I also love the idea that you can cut the cake and eat it at any time during the reception - at the beginning, middle or end, it doesn't matter because everyone loves cheese at any time of the evening! 

I was going to DIY the cake and essentially go to a cheese maker and get large wheels of cheese and assemble them myself by stacking them on top of each other on top of skewers or cake dowels to hold them into place.

Then it would just be a matter of decorating them to make them look fancy enough for a wedding (and not just like a few wheels of cheese stacked on top of one another!). I found some great tutorials online like this one and it really does look quite easy to do.

When I asked our reception venue if I could bring in my own wedding cake made of cheese they told me they'd heard some horror stories of people making their own cake and using the wrong cheese and they had gone soggy or were too pungent and smelly. 

Imagine stinking out your reception venue with pongy cheese OMG that's not what I want my wedding to be remembered for!

So I got a quote from them as well and it came in very reasonably priced and includes all the condiments to go with it as well. Not to mention it's one less thing I need to worry about doing, I'm more than happy to leave it to the chef to sort out for us.

So while the reception will buy and stack the cake of cheese, we still need to pick out 3-4 cheeses we want to have and decorate it. 

Mr P and I had so much fun researching and tasting cheeses at our local cheese shop, taking them home to try with the wines and beers we'll be serving at the wedding reception to get a good idea of what cheeses will work together.

We also got a quote from the cheese shop for them to make a cake of cheese for us but it was more expensive than our venue, plus we would need to assemble it and deliver it ourselves, plus supply all the condiments to go with it. So the easier and least expensive option is to let our reception venue do it for us.

We are having 6-7 kgs of cheese which is about 60-70 grams per person (we have 100 people) and we have chosen a cheddar, brie, blue vein and a smoked cheese.

We need to decorate the cake of cheese ourselves and as mentioned my Mum is excited to help with this and it'll be done just before the wedding reception starts.

We are thinking of rustic decorations like twine, lace or ribbon paired with gum leaves and nuts from the trees on my parents farm and fresh fruits like grapes and figs.

I also want to get a custom made cake topper but there are so many options on Etsy I can't decide on just one!

Otherwise, I can try my hand at making my own. I love the sweet bunting style toppers and they look quite easy to make (similar to the image above).

It's only natural a cheese and wine loving couple like us will have a wedding cake made of cheese!

What do you think of this non traditional wedding cake?

Sharing with link parties:
Curly Crafty Mom - Motivational Monday
The Dedicated House - Make It Pretty Monday
Savvy Southern Style - Wow Us Wednesdays

For exclusive extras and daily updates ... follow Jarrah Jungle on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter

[All images via Pinterest - 1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,7]