Who doesn’t love a good scone?
The quintessential English tea-time nibble, scones always go down well and are the prefect example of how a few basic pantry staples can unite to form a delectablebaked treat!
Essentially made with just flour, butter, milk and raising agents, scones are the very definition of effortless baking, but like so much in life, such simplicity belies grave pitfalls. Firstly, do not over work the dough – you want your scones to be as light and fluffy as possible, so a gentle touch is best. Secondly (and perhaps most importantly), scones shouldalways be servedfresh, preferably straight out of the oven. If you must reheat yourscones, then you should only ever do so ina pre-heatedovenand NEVER the microwave. If you are ever tempted to use your microwave to reheat your scones,don’t – they will rebelbyabandoning their light textureand will become rubbery.Yuck.
I have a dearfriend whoadores her scones and always orders them when we go out for tea, but not before she interrogates the waitron about their scone-etiquette. The interrogationusually goes along the lines of, “Are your scones good?Are they fresh? When exactly were they made? How do you re-heat them?”. If there is no mention of a microwave then the poor waitron hassurvived the interrogationand their scones have been deemed worthy. It may seem pedantic to ask so many questions about a simple scone, butmany a goodsconehas been ruined by shoddy and hasty reheating, so it never hurts to ask, lest you be disappointed.
One of the other reasons I love scones istheminimal effort they take to make.Baking does not comenaturally to me, so I don’t really like recipesthat are too involved or complicated, which makes whipping up a batch of sconesan absolute delight and perfect for my limited skill-set.The mixing and kneading takes virtually no time at all and the scones are, more often than not, readyfor bakingbefore the oven has had time to heat up. Now that’s my kind ofbaking!
When it comes to what you should serve with your scones, I’m afraid I am an unabashed traditionalist. For mescones should only everbe served with good strawberry jam, butter and clotted cream, but the latter is quite hard to source outside the UK so I normally settle for justthe jam and butter.
To discover other delicious Sweet Treats from The Muddled Pantry, please click here
Traditional English Scones: makes 12
- 500g cake flour (plain flour)
- 2 tsp. bicarbonate of soda
- 1 tsp. salt
- 4 tsp. cream of tartar
- 130g cold butter, cubed
- 300ml milk
- 1 egg, beaten
Method:
- Preheat you oven to 200ºC
- Using a fine sieve sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and cream of tartar into a mixing bowl
- Add the cold butter cubes and rub until the butter combines with the dry ingredients. The mixture should feel like damp sand. This can be done with a mixer should you not want to do it by hand
- Add the milk and mix briefly until just combined
- Turn themixture out onto a heavily floured surface and knead lightly until you have a soft dough. The dough will be quite wet initially, but it will come together quite quickly. Add a bit more flour should you feel the need to
- Roll the dough out to a thickness of about 3cm and, using a round cookie cutter (6cm diameter), cut out your scones. You will probably need to re-roll the dough to get 12 out of the batch
- Place the scones on a lined baking tray andbrush the tops with thebeaten egg
- Bake inthe pre-heated oven for between 10 to 12 minutes
- Serve immediately with butter, jam and cream
