Polish Bread and salt wedding tradition

Weddings offer the perfect opportunity for couples to embrace wedding traditions tied to familial cultural roots. Among polish wedding traditions, one that many brides and grooms choose to include on their wedding day is the bread and salt tradition. 

Historically, bread and salt is at the center of traditional welcome ceremonies in Slavic and European cultures as well as Middle Eastern cultures. Over time it has been adopted as a pleasant and meaningful way to celebrate two families coming together as the parents of the bride and groom welcome the newlywed couple to the wedding reception.

 

Bread and salt tradition

While the bread and salt wedding tradition is a European tradition, its origins are generally attributed to Poland where the welcoming with bread and salt is an honored custom. Today it is most often observed as part of the wedding celebration as newlyweds are greeted with bread and salt by their parents at the wedding reception. An announcement is made:

“This is a long cherished Polish tradition which has been passed down through the centuries. It symbolizes the union of the Bride and Groom and their families.”

The parents of the bride and groom greet the newlyweds with a loaf of wedding bread sprinkled with salt and a glass of wine. The parents say, "According to our Old Polish tradition, we greet you with bread and salt so that your home might always enjoy abundance." Then they offer the bread to the newlyweds to eat followed by a glass of wine from which the bride and groom drink. The parents then kiss the bride and groom and welcome then to the family.

Symbolism of bread and salt ceremony

• Bread: Represents the parents' hope that their children will never experience hunger or need. 
• Salt: Salt sprinkled on the bread is a reminder to the couple that their life may be difficult at times, and they must learn to cope with life's struggles together. 
• Wine: Wine symbolizes the parents' hope that the bride and groom will never thirst and will have a life of good health and cheer and that they will share the company of many good friends. 
• Kiss: This parents' kiss is a symbol of their love and unity.

 

 

Sta Lot

The bread and salt ceremony concludes with the song Sta Lot. It wishes good luck to the couple that lasts for 100 years. This celebration is big and wedding guests really enjoy it. Here is a rough translation of the main verse:

May their star of prosperity

Never extinguish!

Never extinguish!

And whoever won't sing with us

May they sleep under the table!

May they sleep under the table!

At the conclusion of this short ceremony, the bride, groom, and their parents proceed to their tables and await the saying of grace before the meal.

 

Photo credits: Forever Video, Polishroots

 

Medieval wedding cake: Bride’s Pie

I've written about the evolution of the wedding cake tradition and how it started back in Roman times as a loaf of hearty bread broken over the bride's head, but today I want to take a look back to the medieval kitchen to another dish served as a precursor to the wedding cake we enjoy today -- the Bride's Pie.

Medieval wedding cake

If you’re thinking of a medieval theme for your wedding, it might be fun to consider a Bride’s Pie instead of a wedding cake, although I have to say your guests will really have to be as into acting out the medieval scenario as you are, or at the least have an adventuresome culinary spirit. The earliest recipe I could find for “Bride’s Pye” dates back to the Middle Ages and is found in the The Accomplisht Cook. The book is written in old English and terms and cuts of meat have changed since it was written, but I just had to include the original recipe for my readers in order to accentuate how much things have changed.

Medieval Kitchen

Before you read the recipe, let me offer a warning. It’s not a sweet dessert-type dish but a savory pie recipe and back then nothing went to waste. For instance, when the recipe calls for “sweet-breads” of veal, it is talking about the thymus or the pancreas from veal. Cock-combs are an edible flower. Most of the rest of the ingredients you'll recognize.

Medieval wedding cake was known as Bride's Pie

 

Bride’s pie recipe 1685

To make an extraordinary Pie, or a Bride Pye of several Compounds, being several distinct Pies on one bottom. Provide cock-stones and combs, or lamb-stones, and sweet-breads of veal, a little set in hot water and cut to pieces; also two or three ox-pallats blanch’t and slic’t, a pint of oysters, slic’t dates, a handful of pine kernels, a little quantity of broom buds, pickles, some fine interlarded bacon slic’t; nine or ten chestnuts rosted and blanch season them with salt, nutmeg, and some large mace, and close it up with some butter. For the caudle, beat up some butter, with three yolks of eggs, some white or claret wine, the juyce of a lemon or two; cut up the lid, and pour on the lear, shaking it well together; then lay on the meat, slic’t lemon, and pickled barberries, and cover it again, let these ingredients be put in the moddle or scollops of the Pye.

If you’re not quite adventuresome enough to go with this authentic recipe, you can always go with

Medieval wedding cake topper

 

the savory pie recipe of your choice. And to make this custom your own, why not eat it as the main dish and still enjoy a traditional wedding cake with a medieval wedding cake topper for dessert with your guests. It will still be a special way to make your wedding celebration unique and delicious.

* * *

Some links in this post are affiliate links. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to amazon.com and affiliate sites.

Thanks so much for being part of our success.

Photo credits: wikipedia, wikimedia.org