Presenting your guests with an edible wedding favor, or bomboniere, is a time honoured way to thank them for sharing your wedding day. The traditional edible wedding favour is five sugared almonds, wrapped in tulle, symbolising health, wealth, happiness, long life and fertility.
However, in recent years there has been a move away from edible wedding favors, and couple are giving anything from potted plants and engraved shot glasses to framed photos and candles. Here are some of the pros and cons of edible wedding favors if you are weighing up your options:
Four reasons to have edible wedding favors
As well as being more traditional, edible wedding favors or bombonieres usually work out cheaper than non edible gifts. Whether you choose sugared almonds, chocolate bars, cookies, or sweets, bulk buying these items and dividing them between gift boxes or bags won’t be as expensive as buying individual gifts for each guest.
Edible wedding favors can easily be home made without looking cheap or tacky. Giving a home made bomboniere is very fashionable, and adds a personal touch to your wedding ceremony. Home made cookies in a clear cellophane bag tied with a ribbon are a popular bomboniere. Trying to make a non edible wedding favor yourself can be more difficult unless you are particularly talented with a needle and thread or paintbrush.
There will always be guests that aren’t very keen on your choice of wedding breakfast dessert, or the flavour of wedding cake you have chosen. Providing an edible bomboniere gives them an alternative sweet treat to snack on.
If you have edible wedding favors you can embrace the current top trend and have a candy bar. This means that you fill bowls, jars or baskets with sweets, chocolates, cookies and other edible delicacies and provide boxes or bags that guests can fill up themselves.
Three reasons to think twice about edible wedding favors
If you decide to have edible favors you will need to put some thought into how they are packaged and stored to stop them from melting or becoming sticky, particularly if you are having an outdoor summer wedding. Depending on the type of food you use, edible bombonieres may have to be prepared just before the wedding, whereas non edible wedding favors can be prepared weeks in advance.
Edible wedding favors won’t last very long, and the majority of guests will eat them on the day of the wedding. This means that you spend a lot of time and effort on the container or wrapping, only for it to be discarded after a couple of hours. Many couples like to give a wedding favor that will last for a long time and remind their guests of the wedding, and in this case a non edible bomboniere may be a better choice.
Many of your guests will start eating their bombonieres during or even before your wedding breakfast. This has two disadvantages in that it may spoil their appetite for the meal, and you will get torn bomboniere wrappers all over your beautifully decorated tables.
