Welsh cake

Welsh cakes (Welsh: picau ar y maen, pice bach, cacennau cri or teisennau gradell), also known as bakestones, griddle cakes, or pics, are a traditional sweet bread from Wales. They are small, round, spiced cakes that are cooked on a griddle or bakestone rather than baked in an oven, giving them a distinctive texture between a biscuit, scone, and pancake.

Welsh cakes have been popular since the late 19th century and emerged from the addition of fat, sugar, and dried fruit to traditional flatbread recipes that were already being cooked on griddles. They became particularly associated with the South Wales coalfield during the height of the Welsh coal mining industry, when they served as portable, nutritious food for miners to take underground. Food historian Carwyn Graves notes in his scholarly analysis that Welsh cakes represent "a heritage both of griddle cakes" that formed part of Wales's distinctive grain culture, positioned at "the intersection of a 'Celtic' oat-based tradition and a northern European wheat/barley/rye tradition."