Ingredients
Please let me introduce you to the buttermilk scone, a homely, dutiful scone, bountiful with the promise of warm kitchens, sleepy cats and Aga Sagas. Wave hubby on his way, whistling cheerfully officewards, don a starched apron and get down to some good old-fashioned housewifery. Once you have made a buttermilk scone there will be no return to the bland scone of yesterday; no siree Bob.
Taken from Miss Hope's Teatime Treats by Hope and Greenwood (Ebury, £12.99)
- 225g (8oz) plain flour, sifted, plus extra to dust
- 50g (2oz) unsalted butter
- 1tsp baking powder
- 25g (loz) golden caster sugar
- 125ml (4½fl oz) buttermilk
- Splash of milk (if needed)
- Clotted cream and good rasberry jam, to serve
- A punnet of raspberries, to serve
Method
- Preheat the oven to 220°C/425°F/Gas 7. Line a baking sheet with baking parchment.
- Dash the flour and butter into a bowl and rub the butter into the flour using your delicate girl hands, until the mixture looks like breadcrumbs. Stir in the baking powder, sugar and buttermilk with a wooden spoon to make a tip-top dough. Add a splash of milk if the mixture seems a tad dry. Tip the mixture out onto a lightly floured board and knead very gently to bring together into one harmonious lump.
- Primp the dough into a round shape and use a knife to mark it into six wedges, clock-like, cutting down into the dough enough to mark them but not all the way through. Pop the promising round dough lump on the prepared baking sheet an d place in the oven for 15-20 mins until golden and glorious. Cool on a wire rack and serve with clotted cream, jam and raspberries.
Top tips
To make small scones, pat or roll the dough until it's 2½cm (1in) thick. Use a 5cm (2in) round cutter to stamp out the rounds - you may need to re-roll once or twice, and you'll make 10 small scones, plus a piggly-wiggly runt (the little bit of dough at the end which is too small to be stamped out into a round). Bake in the oven for 12-15 mins.
