Ash cake (also known as ash bread or fire cake) is a type of bread baked over a layer of heated stones or sand and covered-over in hot ashes, a practice still found principally in Arabian countries, especially among Bedouins.
In northern Yemen, ash cakes were called jamrī (جَمْرِي), typically made thick, and baked directly over coals kept in a special vessel made of basalt-stone. In some places, ashes are spread over the face of the dough before being embedded entirely within the hot coals. Bedouins in Yemen would not embed the dough within hot coals, but rather stick the dough on the backside of an iron skillet, and fill the hollow space of the skillet with hot coals. In Arabia, ash cake is served with a treacle of date syrup (dibs) and with clarified butter (samne).
In northern Iran, ash-cakes are prepared by laying out the dough over live coals carried in a brazier, upon which dough several pieces of hot coals are also carefully laid. Since the bread comes out hard and dry, it is customarily practiced to break up the bread into small pieces and to mix it with butter and work it with one's hands to be formed into a ball before it can be made palatable.
In North America, ash cakes were primarily made by using cornmeal. Enslaved African Americans often relied on ash cakes as a staple food. This tradition was likely influenced by Native American techniques for making thinly leavened breads. The manner of preparation varied, although one popular method was to brush aside the hot ashes, lay a large collard green or cabbage leaf upon the hot earth or cast-iron oven, upon which was poured a batter of cornmeal, and over which was laid another leaf, and the hot ashes piled thereon.
In Europe, ash cakes were made into a small, round and flat loaf, usually consisting of a little wheat and sometimes rye, baked under an inverted iron pan over which the ashes of the fire were heaped. This was almost exclusively the bread of the peasants. In French, this type of bread was called fougasse.