Before that the cakewalk was an actual dance. Interesting story there. In the old South (before the Civil War) rich, aristocratic plantation owners sent their kids to Europe to get educated and to pick up -culture-. The kids came back with European styles, foods, etc., and also European dances. ‘Walking dances’ were very popular in those days, like the landler, the national dance of Austria. So in dances at the plantations the rich white people would do these dances.

Black people saw white people doing these dances and imitated them. White people saw the black people doing their own version of the walking dances and didn’t realize they were imitations, so the whites imitated the blacks, and that’s how the dance called the cakewalk was invented.

A similar thing happened in rock music in the 1960s. The Beatles came to America and Americans loved their sound. We thought their sound was something new, and American bands tried to imitate them. But the Beatles weren’t really trying to create a new sound. They thought they were just imitating Elvis Presley, the Everly Brothers, etc.

The term “cakewalk” is often used to indicate something that is very easy or effortless. Though the dance itself could be physically demanding, it was generally considered a fun, recreational pastime. The phrases “takes the cake” and “piece of cake” also come from this practice

Today one version of the Cakewalk is kept alive by traditional Scottish Highland dancers. The Cakewalk is sometimes taught, performed and competed in within the Highland Dance community, especially in the southern United States.

The cakewalk is also now seen as a game in church and school bazaars and fairs. Participants walk around a path with numbered squares in time with music; when the music stops, a number is called out and the person standing on that square receives a cake. Cakes are usually donated by members of the church or school and the participants buy tickets to play.

This also gave us the expression ‘cake walk’ and ‘a piece of cake’ both meaning a job or contest that’s very easy to achieve or win, and the variations ‘takes the biscuit’, or ‘take the bun’, meaning to win (although nowadays in the case of ‘takes the biscuit’ is more just as likely to be an expression of being the worst, or surpassing the lowest expectations). The variations of bun and biscuit probably reflect earlier meanings of these words when they described something closer to a cake.

http://www.businessballs.com/clichesorigins.htm

cake·walk (kāk’wôk’)

n.

Something easily accomplished: Winning the race was a cakewalk for her.

A 19th-century public entertainment among African Americans in which walkers performing the most accomplished or amusing steps won cakes as prizes.

A strutting dance, often performed in minstrel shows.

The music for this dance.

http://www.answers.com/topic/cakewalk

RE:
Where did the expresion "cake walk" come from?