Apple and Nutmeg Scones

With all of the strange weather we've had here in the UK over the growing season many crops have been early, late or just downright confused as to what they should be doing and when. One of the sad things is that this year's apple harvest is very poor and there may be shortages later on in the season. I love apples and I'm very much hoping that they will still be available for a good while yet, but I guess that some years are always going to be worse than others. It's very odd though - round here (Northwest England) other crops have been difficult - my mum's friend has a tree that is usually groaning under the weight of plums - the branches dip to the ground and have to be supported, yet this year she barely had a single plum.

Anyway, whatever happens later in the season, the new apples are here for now and I intend to make the most of them while they are around. Perfectly in season and all of the chilly weather recently (and the dark mornings closing in - I hate getting up in the dark) has put me in mind of warming autumnal flavours, and for me, that means spice.

Apples take to spicing so well, and I decided to use a combination of mixed spice and then give it a little spin with a bit of nutmeg. This is one of my less used spices simply because I'm a little lazy and nutmeg needs grating just before you use it for the best flavour. The whole nutmegs keep for years, but the fragrance and beautiful aroma of this spice is lost quickly after grating.

Apple and Nutmeg Scones
Ingredients
250g ricotta cheese
a little milk (or water)
60g caster sugar
50g light muscovado sugar
280g self raising flour
70g butter
1/4tsp mixed spice
about 1/4 of a small nutmeg, grated
2 small coxes apples, cored but not peeled, cut into small cubes
demerara sugar to sprinkle

Method

- Preheat the oven to gas 6/200C. Place a sheet of parchment paper on a baking sheet.

- Place the ricotta in a small bowl, beat in the 60g of caster sugar and set aside.

- Place the flour in a large bowl and rub in the butter (I used fridge cold butter here)

- Add the muscovado sugar and the spices to the flour and mix well, breaking up any lumps of sugar.

- Add the apples to the flour mixture.

- Add the ricotta mixture to the flour mixture and bring together as a dough. You will probably need a little extra liquid - I found my mixture quite dry and as I don't usually have milk around, I used a little water to moisten it. I didn't measure it but probably about 4tbsp.

- Tip the dough onto a work surface and knead briefly - more just turning the dough over to bring it together. Pat out into a large square about 1 1/2" or 3cm thick.

- Cut into 16 pieces and transfer to the baking sheet. Scatter with demerara sugar.

- Bake for 20-25 minutes until risen and golden.

- Remove and allow to cool on a wire rack.

It has to be said that these weren't the lightest scones I've ever made, but I'm still enjoying them very much - the warm autumnal spicing, with the unusual addition of nutmeg along with the juicy chunks of apple make a very good combination for a snack time treat or would be great served with some chunks of tasty cheese for a more substantial snack.

I am entering these into alphabakes, hosted this month by Ros of The More than Occasional Baker (cohosted by Caroline of Caroline Makes). The letter this month is N for nutmeg.

I am also entering them into Simple and in Season, founded by Ren of Fabulicious Food and hosted this month by Nazima of Franglais Kitchen

International Scone Week - Blueberry Vanilla Ricotta Scones

It's International Scone Week - hop over to Fig Jam and Lime Cordial for a bit more of an explanation! Scones are popping up all over the place Joanna has some interesting looking experimental Kombucha scones, Misky has made Celia's lemonade scones, and Heidi is making lots of scones. So as a confirmed scone lover I'm wading in with my offering this time. 

You can find all of my previous scone blog posts by clicking here.

Other scones I'd like to try from around the web...
Dan Lepard's Ginger Beer Scones 
Dan Lepard's Vanilla Almond Scones (I'll miss off the almonds!)
A savoury alternative to sandwiches Mediterranean Scones
Some with strong flour Fig and Date Scones
Celia's Lemonade Scones
A Frying Pan Pizza with a scone-like base

Blueberry Vanilla Ricotta Scones (adapted from BBC Good Food)
Ingredients
250g ricotta
120g golden caster sugar
280g self raising flour
70g butter
100g fresh blueberries
1tsp vanilla extract (or a little more)

Method

- Preheat the oven to gas 5 1/2/190C. Place a sheet of parchment paper on a baking sheet.

- Place the ricotta in a bowl, beat in 60g sugar and the vanilla extract and set aside.

- Place the flour in a large bowl and rub in the butter (I used fridge cold butter here).

- Mix the remaining sugar into the flour/butter mix.

- Add the ricotta mixture to the flour mixture and bring together almost into a dough. When it has nearly combined, add the blueberries and continue to mix.

- Tip onto a floured surface and briefly knead to bring together. (Well, not really knead, just bring it together - by squashing it a bit really)

- Pat out into a large square about 1 1/2" or 3cm thick (it's a bit vague - it sort of depends on how deep you want your scones).

- Cut into 16 pieces (the dough will be fairly dry) and transfer to the baking sheet, spacing apart a bit, as they expand during baking.

- Bake for around 25 minutes until risen and golden. I returned the centre four of my scones to the oven for an extra 5 minutes because they didn't seem quite as done.

- Cool on a wire rack.

This has to be one of my absolute favourite scone recipes, and it has made an appearance on the blog before, but I make no apologies for bringing it out again in a different guise, because until you've tried these you really don't know what you're missing. They're moist and full of vanilla flavour and juicy goodness of the blueberries and don't really even need any butter, although a good dollop of blueberry jam (Bonne Maman do one I'm particularly fond of) wouldn't go amiss.

What's your favourite scone recipe? What am I missing that I should really try?

Treacle Scones and Parlies

I am full of good intentions... always. It's just that they don't always work themselves through to reality and completion.

Last month I saw that the second of the Best of British challenges was being hosted by Janice of Farmersgirl Kitchen, which I always really enjoy reading - Janice has a lovely mix of mains, sweets and baking on her blog and always comes across as being down to earth and genuine. I had intended to enter this challenge when it was being hosted by Choclette in the first month, with the region of (obviously) Cornwall. This challenge is being sponsored by New World appliances. The region this month is Scotland. I was quite excited by this, because one of my favourite food writers is Scottish - Sue Lawrence. I have mentioned her before on the blog - she has a couple of excellent baking books full of enticing recipes, but she also concentrates on her home country too. I have 'Scots Cooking' 'Scottish Kitchen' and 'A Cooks Tour of Scotland: From Barra to Brora in 120 recipes' all of which are really enjoyable to read. I love her style of writing - there is always some background given above the recipe - the history of the name of the dish, or a producer that she particularly associates with this dish, or some childhood memory that the dish brings back for her.

So needless to say I was keen to make something out of one of these books. I had plans for showcasing some of Scotland's glorious produce - the berries from Scotland are delicious and there are plenty more amazing Scottish producers and products too. However, I have run out of time to make good on my plans so instead I have gone a different route. Scotland is known for its home baking, which is perfect for my blog really, and so I decided to make something using an ingredient that I associate with Scotland - black treacle! Don't ask me why, but it seems Scottish to me, and there are certainly a lot of recipes in Sue Lawrence's books that make good use of the sticky black substance - yum!

I made Treacle Scones, which are something I've made before. These ones had a touch of mixed spice and a touch of ginger, which is lovely. I have to admit that they weren't quite as sweet as I would have liked so I'll add some sugar next time. In the introduction to this recipe Sue tells us 'I have always loved treacle puddings and bakes. Black treacle is popular in Scotland, whether in steamed puddings, gingerbread or scones. Definitely a woman after my own heart!

They rose really well and were light and fluffy. They are perfect served with plenty of soft butter and a cup of tea.

The next recipe I decided to make was for Parlies. Now I'll excuse you for not having heard of these before - I certainly hadn't until I decided to make the recipe! They are a type of gingerbread (yum!) baked as biscuits. Gingerbread bisuits sounded great to me! They are soft when you remove them from the oven but they firm up as they cool to become crisp but slightly chewy in the centre.

This is what Sue has to say on these little treats 'The name is short for parliament cakes, and it is said to derive from their popularity with members of the Scots parliament. In late eighteenth century Edinburgh, a lady called Mrs Flockhart ran a shop and tavern..... her eminent customers - including Mr Scott (father of Sir Walter) and several Lords - would pass through the shop to the back room to partake of a dram or two and some gingerbread or biscuits.'

It all sounds rather good to me and so I gave them a try. It's a simple recipe consisting of butter, plain flour, treacle ginger and dark muscovado sugar. The appearance of mine is a little uneven. I was wary of mixing them too much because it is noted in the introduction that overmixing the dough will make them tough. They were just as described, slightly crispy on the outside, but lovely and chewy within. The ginger, treacle and dark muscovado sugar combine to make them rich and treacly - perhaps not one for small children, but perfect for me - I love gingery flavours. I might have to update this when my sense of taste comes back properly though - I've got a miserable cold and have lost the ability to taste properly!

For the recipes I used 'Scots Cooking' by Sue Lawrence - I thoroughly recommend buying it (and no, this is not a sponsored post!)

I am also entering these into Jac's Bookmarked recipes event - I've had these books for such a long time without cooking anything out of them, it's almost a relief to finally be able to say they've been used.

Chocolate Ricotta Scones - We Should Cocoa

Chocolate and Cheese - mmm, yes please?! This months We Should Cocoa challenge, set by Choclette of Choc Log Blog is to make something both chocolate-y and cheesey. And not cheesey as in just-a-bit-naff kind of cheesey. My first thought was chocolate cheesecake - yum! but I decided I was in a contrary mood and didn't want to go for something obvious.

My next thought was my rather lovely book Adventures with Chocolate by Paul A. Young. I really, really must start making things out of this book, because there are so many interesting recipes in there - really different too. Quite a few would have worked for this month's challenge too - Savoury sandwich ganache, Goat's cheese and lemon ganache, Sweet chocolate pesto or Dark chocolate and chilli gnocchi, with mascarpone and pecorino. I wish I were more adventurous!!!

However, I am delighted to present you with these rather gorgeous scones instead. They are based on my favourite recipe (original can be found here) and I have made them over and over again in a number of forms. This one obviously contains chocolate! My chocolate of choice here is something rather bitter - an 85% (I usually use Lindt) because it contrasts so well with the sweet sugar topping of the scone and the moist interior. I love biting down on a little piece of chocolate heaven.

An added bonus is that these are pretty easy and fairly quick to make, which is perfect when you're running out of time....

Chocolate Ricotta Scones
Ingredients
175g ricotta
100g caster sugar
200g self raising flour
50g butter
1-2tbsp milk
40g 85% cocoa solid chocolate, chopped
demerara sugar to sprinkle
I sometimes add a little vanilla extract too if I remember, which is always good.

I use the method detailed here so won't reproduce it again. However, when it comes to shaping the scones, I make a long rectangle, and mark into 10 scones because this suits my purposes better.

Perhaps not the most ground breaking introduction to the cheese and chocolate combo, but because these scones are just so delicious I keep on coming back to them again and again - soft, moist, crunchy with sugar and those little nuggets of bitter chocolate hiding from you in the midst of it all. Bliss is a chocolate ricotta scone!

Crystallised Stem Ginger and Treacle Scones

As regular readers will know, I do love a good scone - light or substantial, fruited or plain, served with butter, jam, clotted cream, or all of these, or even on their own!

So when Karen of Lavender and Lovage (who co-hosts with Kate of What Kate Baked) announced that this month's Tea Time Treats theme was scones, I was very pleased. Why then, has it taken me until almost the deadline to find a treat that I want to share with you? I kept imagining more and more delicious flavour combinations that I could add to tempt you to make my scones, something different, something unusual, mango and cardamom perhaps? or maybe chilli and chocolate? but then I realised that when I want scones I want something old fashioned, but with a little twist. A teatime treat, but not one you'd be able to buy in a tea shop or the supermarket.

One of my favourite flavours is ginger. And black treacle and ginger are a combination made in heaven so it is with great pleasure that I give you my Crystallised Stem Ginger and Treacle Scones.

Crystallised Stem Ginger and Treacle Scones
Ingredients
225g self raising flour
1/2tsp baking powder
2 tsp ground ginger
50g butter
90ml milk
1 rounded tbsp black treacle (about 35g)
40g crystallised stem ginger, chopped small
A little flour to sift over

Method

- Preheat the oven to Gas 6 1/2/210C. Line a baking tray with parchment paper.

- Place the flour, baking powder and ginger into a bowl, mixing to distribute the ingredients. Add the butter and rub in until it looks like breadcrumbs.

- Measure the milk into a jug, add the treacle and warm gently in the microwave. I did this to help the treacle distribute evenly through the mixture. Mix well until the treacle has dissolved in the milk.

- Add the crystallised stem ginger to the dry ingredients and mix in.

- Add the milk/treacle mixture and stir, bringing together the dough. Add a touch more milk if the dough seems too dry and crumbly.

- Tip onto a smooth surface. If necessary, bring together all the crumbs, but I don't knead my scone dough. Pat out the dough to not less than about 1 1/2" or 4cm thick.

- Cut out rounds (I used a 2"/5cm cutter) and place on baking tray. Dust lightly with flour - or you could brush with milk.

- Bake for 16-18 minutes until risen and golden (slightly tricky to tell as they start out darker than normal!)

- Allow to cool on a wire rack.

Best eaten the day of making, but I often freeze leftovers to warm in the microwave - yum!

Perhaps not my favourite scone recipe, a touch crumbly but nice and light, with the treacle adding more perhaps in the way of colour than flavour, but still adding its own sweetness to an otherwise unsweetened scone. The ground ginger adds the background ginger flavour and the crystallised stem ginger gives the real punch of ginger flavour for the ginger lover. Great with butter but even better with some ginger conserve.

Chocolate ricotta scones

I knew it was only a matter of time before I turned my new favourite scone recipe into a chocolate version, especially after seeing Choclette's lovely scones during international scone week. That time came when I realised I needed to use up some ricotta cheese sitting quietly in my fridge (undemanding stuff, that ricotta) before it expired.

As with lots of the best things in life, these are quick and easy to make, but more satisfying than you would think. The original recipe can be found here on the BBC Good Food website.

Double chocolate ricotta scones
Ingredients
175g ricotta cheese
100g caster sugar
175g self raising flour
25g cocoa powder
50g butter
60g dark chocolate, chopped fairly small (I used Lindt 85% and broke each 10g piece into 16.....)
1-2tbsp milk (or water)
demerara sugar, to sprinkle

Method

- Preheat the oven to Gas 6/200C. Line a baking sheet with parchment.

- Mix the ricotta with half of the caster sugar. Set aside.

- Rub the butter into the flour and cocoa powder until like fine breadcrumbs. Add the remaining sugar.

- Spoon in the ricotta mixture and mix until well combined, adding the chopped chocolate part way through. Add a tbsp or so of milk or water to get a soft but not sticky dough.

- Tip onto the work surface (I worked on a piece of parchment to stop it sticking), knead very briefly, and shape into a round 4cm 11/2 inches deep. Mark into 6 or 8 sections, as desired.

- Sprinkle with demerara sugar and bake for 20-25 minutes.

- Allow to cool on a wire rack.

I definitely left mine in for longer because it's really difficult to tell when something brown is 'risen and golden' and think I probably overbaked it a little as it was slightly drier than the other versions I have made.

Oh so good. If you are a chocolate lover this is one for you - very, very chocolate-y with both the cocoa powder and chunks of intense 85% cocoa chocolate providing the requisite hit, these are something to be enjoyed alone - not a scone for jam or clotted cream, but one to be savoured as it is. Bliss. I love them. 

MM8 - Crunchy crusted citrus scones - International scone week

What, you mean you hadn't heard about this?!? It's international scone week!!! (Check out Celia's blog for links to some of last year's participants) And I couldn't be happier because I love scones. I'm sure I've said this before, but never mind, now I've said it again. They're just such a good portable snack - not too sweet, not too rich (well, until you slather with butter/clotted cream/jam), they're quick and easy to make and bake and they're all round fantastic. I've tried out a few recipes for scones, but tend to stick to my old tried and true recipe (1lb self raising flour, 4oz butter, 2oz sugar, 3.5oz raisins) which I know by heart, in pounds and ounces because I've been making them since I can remember and I started to cook in pounds and ounces! I've been known to go to the freezer after dinner, realise that I'm all out of scones and turn the oven back on to knock out a quick batch to satisfy my craving...

So it takes some recipe to trump my T&T. Well, I think this one has done it and done it with style. And what's most annoying is that I've known of the recipe for years. I remember reading the recipe in the April 2002 edition of BBC Good Food and wondering when I could make them. I was at uni, without a reliable oven and then by the time I arrived home I'd forgotten about them. Over the years they've popped in and out of my memory, always being pushed down by something else that looked more exciting, but I have finally, finally managed to get round to making them. I'm so cross - nine years of missing out on these delicious treats. If you're a fan of scones make sure to make these soon, don't make my mistake and wait for years before trying them.

As you can see, I've already made them three times! The recipe is here, and I followed it exactly, well almost. I subbed lemon for orange. The first time I made them I decided to make a large round, as instructed in the recipe. Mine caught a little because I was unsure as to whether it was cooked through and left it in a little too long. It didn't taste burnt though, contrary to appearance. I did divide it into eight rather than six though, which was a good decision as the eight were still quite large! The next time I decided to use a cutter and got 12 rounds. There is a lot to be said for making one large round though - it's much quicker to shape the dough, and the end result seemed to be moister than the smaller ones. Don't forget to sprinkle with sugar - that crunch is one of the lovely things about them!

Having made this discovery, when I made the third batch I switched back to one large round. For the third making, I chose fresh cherries and vanilla although I can't quite remember how much of either I added, I'd guess about 100g fresh cherries, stoned and halved and a tsp of vanilla. Wow were they delicious - the vanilla and cherry combo was just gorgeous - the dough being vanilla flavoured and punctuated by juicy bursts of cherry. Can you tell I'm in love?

This is such a good recipe - these are the moistest scones I've ever had, and the lemon flavour permeates them so well. I can imagine that they'd be great served as suggested with clotted cream and lemon curd, but actually, they're moist enough to be utterly delicious on their own - no added butter or other embellishment needed. And I still have some in my freezer ..... yum!!!

This is the next in my series of 'Marked and Made' recipes - those that have been languishing too long in the 'to make' pile. Jac, over at Tinned Tomatoes has recently revived the Bookmarked Recipes (founded by Ruth at Ruth's Kitchen Experiments) event and so I'm submitting it to that too. Have you finally got round to making something that's been in the pile for far too long?  (And don't pretend you don't have a pile, you know exactly what I'm talking about!!!) Check out the round up too!

Oat and maple syrup scones

I love scones, they make a great snack - not too heavy but substantial enough to fill a gap. And even better when topped with butter (preferably melted) and jam. So when I saw this recipe at Smitten Kitchen I couldn't wait to try it. I loved the idea of including oats and a proportion of wholemeal flour in the recipe, and having enjoyed these maple syrup cupcakes, I wanted to see how the maple syrup flavour worked with the scones.

I didn't want too many scones, so halved the recipe and made them slightly smaller than specified.

Oat and Maple Syrup Scones (adapted from Smitten Kitchen)

Ingredients

130g plain white flour

40g wholemeal flour

20g oats

2 level tsp baking powder

55g butter

40g maple syrup

90ml milk

Method

- Preheat the oven to Gas 6/200C. Put a piece of parchment paper onto a baking tray.

- Rub the butter into the flours, baking powder and oats.

- Add the maple syrup and milk and bring together to a dough.

- Pat out on a floured work surface and then cut out your scones (my cutter was 5cm/2" diameter and I got 8 scones I think). Place on baking tray and brush with milk to glaze.

- Bake for around 15-20 minutes until golden brown.

- Remove to a wire rack to cool.


I added more milk to my adaptation because otherwise I can't imagine them coming together as a dough at all, these weren't particularly sticky to work with and I added quite a bit more milk than specified. I also forgot to add sugar, relying solely on the maple syrup for sweetness.

I'm afraid these really didn't work for me at all. They rose fine and were fairly attractive and I could appreciate the oats had added a nice chewy texture. Sadly the amount of baking powder used was sufficient to give that horrible 'behind the teeth' feeling that I hate - I don't know why it seems to happen if I use plain flour + baking powder, but not with just self raising flour (which after all is just plain flour and a raising agent...) but it was nasty. I couldn't taste maple syrup at all, and found the scones quite dry, perhaps I overbaked them. Anyway, I wouldn't bother with this recipe again, although if you want to try sticking more closely to the Smitten Kitchen recipe perhaps it would work better. Disappointing.

Wholemeal orange chocolate scones

These are largely inspired by Choclette's recent (well, fairly recent!) chocolate scones here. Rooting around in the fridge I discovered that I had yet another tub of half fat creme fraiche that needed to be used as soon as possible. See also here and here (will I never learn - apparently not given that I know there's another tub of the stuff in the fridge as I type). Since scones are often made with buttermilk, an acidic liquid, I reckoned that I could use my creme fraiche for the same purpose. I liked Choclette's idea of adding chocolate to scones and her idea of using partly wholemeal flour and I also found some candied peel in need of using so I created a recipe to suit my needs.

Wholemeal orange chocolate scones

Ingredients

150g self raising flour

150g wholemeal self raising flour

50g butter

35g caster sugar (plus extra demerara for sprinkling on the tops)

40g dark chocolate with candied orange peel, broken into tiny pieces

35g candied peel, snipped finely with scissors

200ml low fat creme fraiche (I used Yeo Valley) plus some water to slacken

Method

- Preheat the oven to gas 6 1/2/210 C. Line a baking tray with parchment.

- Mix the flours in a large bowl and rub in the butter. Mix in the sugar.

- Mix in the chopped peel and chocolate.

- Pour in the creme fraiche and a few tablespoons of water to get the creme fraiche to a more buttermilk like consistency. I'm afraid I just did this by eye and added a little more water until the dough felt a little sticky.

- Bring the dough together and tip onto a floured work surface. Pat out not too thinly and cut out your scones. I used a 2"/5cm cutter and got about 17.

- Dampen the surfaces of the scones with a little milk or water and sprinkle with demerara sugar.

- Bake for 18-20 minutes until lightly golden brown. Allow to cool on a wire rack.

Enjoy, preferably warm with butter.

The creme fraiche worked well enough in these, but to be honest, they weren't my favourite recent bake. I'm not sure why I'm not that enamoured of them, the scones were light and fluffy, if a little on the shallow side (my fault for patting out too thinly I think). I think that the chocolate and orange flavours didn't quite go with the wholemeal flour but I can't put my finger on quite why. My colleagues didn't seem to mind though, and these went quickly.

Edited to add: these are nice, it's just that they're not my favourite - lots of other people liked them....

Blueberry orange yogurt scones

Inspired by Johanna's recent post about her scones, and by Choclette's recent chocolate chip scones, I decided it was long overdue for me to make some more of these delicious treats. I particularly enjoy scones because they're so good for snacks and seem a good way to have a sweet treat without too much fat or sugar.

I had a large pot of yogurt in the fridge that really needed to be used up and recalled that a few months ago Sainsbury's magazine had a feature written by Dan Lepard for scones. There's a basic recipe and then various sweet and savoury variations; blueberry clementine, triple-chocolate pecan, double ginger and apple, almond cherry and then savoury red chilli and tomato, onion, herb and bacon. I can't say the savoury ones are anything I'd usually want to try but the tomato based ones look really good! So, taking inspiration from the blueberry clementine recipe, I decided to make blueberry orange flavoured scones.

I've adapted the recipe a bit to suit what I had available (who has 25ml of double cream hanging round? and what do I do with the rest of the pot once it's open? that ingredient went pretty quickly!). The original recipes can be found in the November 2010 issue of the Sainsbury's magazine.

Blueberry and orange yogurt scones

Ingredients

175g wholemilk yogurt

75g caster sugar

400g plain flour

2 tsp cream of tartar

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

50g cold diced butter

zest of 1 large orange plus 50ml juice (but see below)

100g dried sweetened blueberries

Method

- Preheat the oven to gas 6 1/2/210C. Put a piece of baking parchment on a tray.

- Stir the sugar into the yogurt and leave for a few minutes to dissolve.

- Sift (and I actually did - normally too lazy) the flour, bicarb and cream of tartar into a large bowl.

- Rub in the butter, then add the dried blueberries and stir to mix.

- Zest the orange into the yogurt mixture and add the juice to this.

- Mix the wet ingredients into the dry and bring together to form a dough. At this point I thought it looked a little dry, but persevered, turning the dough out and trying to form it, but ended up putting it back in the bowl to add some more liquid. I think it needs about 2tbsp more liquid than stated in the ingredients above.

- Pat out to about an inch and a half thick and cut out scones in the size you choose. I used a small cutter (2 inch) and got 19 normal scones and a massive offcut scone!

- Moisten the tops a little (I used water here) and sprinkle with demerara sugar.

- Bake for about 12-15 minutes until lightly golden brown.

- Allow to cool on a wire rack, or eat warm if you really can't wait!

This recipe differs quite a bit to my usual recipe. I usually use self raising flour rather than plain plus raising agents and more butter but less sugar. They were reasonably successful but I didn't think they were quite as light as my usual ones. However, this could be due to me overworking the dough with it being initially too dry and having to add more liquid. The flavours were great though - dried blueberries are delicious, it's just a pity they're so expensive usually, and the orange flavour made them interesting enough to eat without butter, although served slightly warmed and with butter would be my favourite way to eat these. I ought to give the recipe another go, perhaps the apple and ginger variation - two of my favourite ingredients!

Cranberry and stem ginger buttermilk scones

A festive take on one of my favourite tea time treats, and a little lighter than some of the richer fare around at this celebratory time of the year. Dried cranberries for their sweet tartness and ginger for warmth during the cold part of the year.
Still perfect with butter, but even better with butter and ginger preserve!

Cranberry and stem ginger scones
Ingredients
225g self raising flour
55g butter
25g golden caster sugar
50g cranberries
3 balls of crystallised stem ginger in syrup (about 40g), chopped
150ml/g buttermilk

Method
- Preheat the oven to gas 6 1/2 ish (about 210C). Line a baking tray with baking parchment.
- Rub the butter into the flour until it forms a breadcrumb type texture.
- Stir in the sugar, cranberries and chopped ginger, trying to break up the ginger as it tends to stick together.
- Add the buttermilk and bring together into a soft dough.
- Tip onto a work surface and pat out to a fairly thick blob. (Around 1 1/2" high)
- Cut out scones (I used a 2" cutter and got about a dozen little scones), reforming the dough as necessary. Dust with flour.
- Bake for 15-18 minutes until lightly golden.
- Allow to cool on a wire rack.

Best enjoyed the same day, freeze any leftovers. Fabulous warmed in the oven or microwave - I'd really recommend warming them up - the ginger flavour seems to be magnified and infuse the whole scone with warmth! These are light and tasty morsels - helped by the use of buttermilk the crumb is really tender and just delicious. (No comments from colleagues - scones are one of the treats I make exclusively for my own enjoyment!)

Fresh raspberry scones

I love scones. If I'm out and about and happen across a tea shop at the right time for a little nibble then the chances are that a scone will be my bake of choice, above all of the chocolate or other fancy cakes out there (I think it's partly that the other cakes are more likely to disappoint, and I hate being disappointed!) and spreading with good butter and dolloping with jam both increase the enjoyment immensely. I don't make them nearly often enough, but was recently reminded of how good they are by Foodycat who had made some delicious looking cultured butter and some rather divine looking fresh buttermilk cherry scones to go with it. The gorgeous picture of the scone, all crusted with crunchy demerara sugar and smeared generously with butter was enough to send me to the kitchen to make my version. I loved the idea of fresh fruit in the scone, almost like a self jamming scone!


I didn't have cherries, but since my favourite fruit at this time of the year is raspberries and I had those ready to go, I wasn't too upset! I used my usual scone recipe with a couple of tweaks, outlined below. If I had previously wondered why fresh fruit scones aren't more popular it could be that it was really, really difficult to work the fruit quickly (time is of the essence) into the dough without them mashing it a pulp, which wasn't really the intention. On this note, cherries might have been easier, or I might use frozen fruit next time to stop it breaking up so much.

Fresh raspberry scones

Ingredients

225g self raising flour

55g butter

25g caster sugar

150ml fat free greek yogurt (needed to be used up!)

about 2-3 tbsp milk to loosen the yogurt (mix this in before you start rubbing in)

125g fresh raspberries

demerara sugar, to sprinkle

Method

- Preheat the oven to 210C/Gas 6 1/2 and line a tray with baking parchment.

- Rub the butter into the flour and then stir in the sugar.

- Working quickly, add the yogurt and milk mixture to the dry ingredients and bring the dough together.

- When nearly together, add the raspberries and try to gently mix them through.

- Tip onto a floured surface, flour your hands and pat down, you don't want it too thin.

- Cut rounds from the dough, squashing together the remnants to form the remaining scones.

- Place on the baking tray and brush with milk, then sprinkle generously with sugar.

- Bake for 15-18 minutes until golden brown.

- Allow to cool completely on a wire rack, or split open, slather with butter and devour!!!

Freeze any scones not eaten the same day and either defrost in the microwave, or heat through in the oven (sorry, no directions as I don't often do this to them!)

I made quite a lot out of this (14 I think) but they really are diddly. I usually make much bigger scones, but I'm happy to eat three of these little ones instead ;-) I think on balance that I prefer dried fruit but it's not going to stop me experimenting further with fresh fruit and other scone flavours!

Thanks, Foodycat, for the inspiration!

Clotted cream shortcake

I found myself with half a tub of clotted cream that I was very loathe to waste and much as it would have been rather delicious eaten all on its own or with a few berries, I feared that I might not be able to moderate my consumption! There's something truly delicious about clotted cream, and breaking through the crust is such a pleasant sensation. Mmmmm, buttery creaminess! If you want to know more about clotted cream, visit the Rodda website, and you can find out more about the history of the product. I decided to bake this rather delicious shortcake, which I could then freeze and enjoy at my leisure. Spreading the enjoyment of the clotted cream even further if you will!

The recipe I decided to use was this one from Dan Lepard. Because I only had half the amount of clotted cream I halved the recipe (naturally!) and I also used self raising flour, omitting the baking powder specified in the recipe (sorry Dan, that's what I had to hand!). I forgot to brush with milk and scatter sugar over before baking, but I'd do that next time because a bit of crunchy sugar topping wouldn't go amiss here. Mine took a little longer to bake than specified, but perhaps my oven wasn't quite hot enough. I made one round with my half batch, not two small ones, and instead of layering the two pieces as specified in the recipe, I split mine and served it with jam. You could add whipped double cream for extra enjoyment, but my fridge is currently occupied by low fat plain yogurt :-( which wouldn't have quite the same effect!!! The jam you see is blackcurrant, which I love, but in this situation I actually preferred strawberry.

The shortcake was rich and moist and delicious and seems to keep better than the scones I usually make. I started to wonder what the difference between shortcake and scones is, generally speaking (i.e. not compared to this recipe using clotted cream) and to my untrained eye there doesn't seem to be much. Shortcake recipes seem to use a higher proportion of fat to flour and sugar, and are often baked as a large (6-7"/15-18cm) round, rather than being individual as scones are but I think that's it. Shortcake to me is a more American treat, whereas scones are more traditionally British. Feel free to correct me though!