This recipe turned out really good scones, light yet substantial and very easy to mix and bake. His recipe included sultanas for fruit scones but as an alternative, I added 8ozs. of grated cheese and 1/2 a tsp. of mixed mustard, ground black peppercorns and sometimes scissor snipped chives, for a savoury flavour.
The trick is not to make the mix too wet or to handle it roughly, thereby, creating a tough dough. So you "pat out" the dough on a floured board to about 2" thick, placing your scones onto a lightly oiled tray and very lightly brush them with a very little milk-wash, then leave your scones to "recover" or rest for a few minutes, before baking in a very hot oven for approx..15 - 20 minutes. Once cooked to a light golden brown mixture, place onto cooling rack before eating. They are delicious warm, with butter!
The trick of baking scones as American "biscuits" i.e. with each item touching each other, to keep the sides soft as they bake, didn't seem to work for my scone recipe; it is a different bake method but it might work for your recipe?
Scones are so easy to make and bake and are good for all occasions, not just with jam and cream for cream teas. Bake them for breakfast with chopped apricots and nuts or a muesli mix; for lunch with cheese and some crisply fried bacon and ground black peppercorns, or chopped ham and for supper, well, anything food you fancy - what about with lightly sautéed mushrooms and spring onions..... Mmm! the choice is endless, only limited by your imagination!
So there's no reason this recipe couldn't work with gluten-free bread flour and I shall bake some today, adding Xantham Gum of course. I believe lemonade is good for gluten-free scones too. There are many online recipes too, of course, so no reason not to get baking.
And for holiday weekends and great festive occasions, there's no need, really, to buy in masses of shop-baked store bread, sliced or not; oh no, just make some fresh-baked scones and watch as everybody tucks into your warm scones with great relish. For breakfast, or a handy snack, I love toasted, or oven-warm scones with home-made marmalade. We even used to eat them with my home-made lemon curd and my own chocolate spread lifted the whole eating experience into even higher realms of delight!!! Oh my, such happy foodie memories.
Another memory comes from watching my grandmother bake scones and it was she who taught the art of scone self-reliance and thrift - bake scones-buy less bread". Grandmother's recipe is safely tucked into my own family recipe book, along with those of other family members.
Oh gosh - no photo-shots for you.....but I'll whip-up a few for later on. I'm out soon to a local gardening club plant and cake stall event at a favourite village and will be looking out for scones!!! Somebody is bound to have baked some for sale !
I'll leave you with a posy of flowers instead, from an earlier family birthday meal, for it's a beautiful sunny morning, on a Bank Holiday weekend, and life's lookin' good!!!
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| Ah Ha! here's one I baked earlier this year - home-made scones with French fig jam, brought home by my daughter from a holiday in France last year.....jolly nice!!! |
No scones for this morning, so I dived into my freezer and found frozen Panettone, and toasted some of that...!
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| just delicious!!! |
Happy week-endings for you too!
Daisy
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