Scones, a staple for any cream tea. I first made scones when I was at school when I was 11 or 12 years old. After learning the basics we were then taught how to make healthy scones... years later and I still make scones but not in the same way as I was taught at school. I no longer use cream of tartar or bicarbonate of soda as I think the scones can some times taste, well, like soda? So now I use self raising flour and baking powder making a much more cakey scone.
When I make scones I tend to make them by eye, what I mean by this is I know exactly how the consistencies should be so I add flour, butter etc until I get that consistency. You don't need any fancy equipment to make scones I tend to use my hands for most of it.
Ingredients:
230g self raising flour (plus a little more for dusting)
1tsp baking powder
60g butter
50g caster sugar
25g glacé cherries (about 4)
25g sultanas
1 large egg
75ml of milk (approx)
- Pre-heat your oven to 180 degrees if fan assisted, check your manuals (or google) for other conversions.
- Sieve your flour and baking powder in to a bowl, add softened butter (if not soft enough cut in to small pieces and add that) and rub the butter in to the flour until all the butter has been rubbed in and the mixture is like fine breadcrumbs. (It's always good to add less flour and then top it up if needed be later).
- Then mix in your sugar, my hands have already been in the bowl so I do this with my hands too ensuring its evenly spread through the mixture.
-Then add in your cherries and sultanas, or just sultanas if you prefer, I like to chop up my cherries too.
- Whisk your egg in a measuring cup until little bubbles start to form on the top, then top up your egg to 150ml with the milk and whisk a little more (just use a manual hand whisk).
- Then add your eggy milk to your dry mixture and start to knead in to a ball. Try not to handle the mixture too much, if it's a bit sticky add some more flour but you don't want it to get too dry.
- Dust down a surface with flour and knead out your dough with your hands. Take a large cutter and begin to cut out your scones. Depending how big you like your scones depends how thickly you should cut. Mine were about 1-1.5cm thick and I got 8 scones from the mixture.
*Tip when your running out of dough stick the off bits in to the cutter and shape in to the cutter to make another scone.
- Put your scones on a greased baking sheet making sure there is at least 2cm between each scone. Then brush some milk on the tops of them.
- Place your scones in the centre of the oven for 10-15 minutes until slightly browning,
- To keep your scones moisture wrap them up in cloth, I used a tea towel. I left them for about 5 minutes before I had one, they were lovely and warm and the butter simply melted in to them. Great with raspberry jam!
Putting the scones to bed.
Shortly after making my scones I started to notice that quite a lot of other people were making scones too! I know why some of them were now too... due to Tea Time Treats! So even though it was unintended I am going to submit my efforts to this blogger challenge too.
Tea Time Treats is a baking challenge hosted by two lovely bloggers Lavender and Lovage and What Katie Baked This month the host is Lavender and Lovage.
