I am aware that for most people, the scone is one of the first things they try when starting out to bake. The reason being because scones are supposedly meant to be very easy to make. Supposedly….because it took me many years before I found a recipe that was easy and turned out great every time.
My first attempts were always a bit doughy. And I also didn’t fare very well when I bought what appeared to be delicious looking scones. They were terrible.
I gave up on my goal of baking a good scone and waited for friends who could do this to turn up with a batch.
Not sure why I even tried again but I did. And I have never stopped making this scone ever since. Especially when someone calls to say they are popping by in half hour or so.
Make these because they are delicious!
Ingredients
- 225g self-raising flour
- 25g caster sugar
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 50g of softened butter
- 1 large egg
- 4-5 TB of milk
Method
- Preheat oven to 220 degrees celsius
- Lightly grease a baking sheet.
- In a large bowl, measure out the flour, baking powder and butter.
- Using your finger-tips rub the flour mixture and butter together until they resemble breadcrumbs.
- Add the sugar.
- In a measuring jug break the egg and lightly beat. Add some milk into the same jug until you have 150ml of liquid.
- Add the liquid to the flour mixture and very lightly and quickly bring everything to together. (keep about a TB of the egg/milk mixture behind in order to brush the tops of the scones before baking)
- Your hands should be done with the mixing after a minute. You are not looking for a smooth dough. It will be messy and untidy looking. Good!
- Add some flour to a work surface and turn the scone dough over. Using your hands lightly pat and spread out the dough to about 1cm thickness. Doesn’t have to be perfect. You can lightly flour a rolling pin as well, and lightly roll out scone dough. I simply use my hands to lightly smooth out.
- Use a 5 or 7cm round cutter, cut out rounds. Make sure to tap your cutter onto some flour before cutting rounds so that the dough does not stick to the cutter.
- Place scones on baking sheets leaving about 5cm space between each scone. Using a brush, add some of the egg/milk mixture lightly over the tops of the scones.
- Bake for about 12-15 minutes until golden brown.
- Cool on a wire rack and eat as fresh as possible.
