Daring Bakers' January 2012 - Scones

Scones, scones, scones. The quintessential English teatime treat usually served with clotted cream and jam. Having lived in Bath, cream teas were a common occurrence. Every time a friend visited, I’d find myself sitting in a quaint cafe, sipping on tea and slathering sinful amounts of clotted cream on my freshly made scone.

It is these times that I find myself missing the UK and especially Bath..
For the first Daring Bakers Challenge of 2012, Audax Artifex was our January 2012 Daring Bakers’ host. Aud worked tirelessly to master light and fluffy scones (a/k/a biscuits) to help us create delicious and perfect batches in our own kitchens!

To clear up any confusion our American friends call these biscuits, and are usually served as part of a main meal. Despite the various terminologies, it is a known fact that scones/biscuits incredibly cheap to make and takes hardly any time to make.

Scones can be sweet or savoury, with an endless possibility of flavour profiles. In fact in the spirit of the challenge I decided it was finally time to unveil the Green Tea Scones recipe that I have been developing. This recipe will be posted later this week.

We were given many handy tips to help us achieve perfect scones; light, fluffy with a perfect balance of flavours.  These tips as well as the challenge recipe can be found here.

Top to bottom: Triple sifted flour, chopped & chilled butter, medium sized fat particles, incorporating the buttermilk into flour, cookie 'scone' cutter, scones fresh out of the oven.

I used my trusted buttermilk scones recipe in this instance as these scones never let me down. Plus there is no need for baking powder which can sometimes produce ‘powdery’ scones. Although I used a different recipe to what the challenge called for, I incorporated the various techniques shared to improve this recipe even further.

It seems that triple sifting flour, which permits plenty of air to the mixture which in turn creates a more light and fluffy scone. Also make sure that the dough remains sufficiently moist, as it creates a lighter scone.

With all scones, it’s important not to overwork the dough as it affects the texture, creating rock hard scones. 

Buttermilk Scones

Adapted from BBC Good Food

Makes 7 scones

Ingredients

225g self raising flour + extra flour for dusting

¼ tsp salt

50g salted butter, chopped into small pieces and chilled

25g caster sugar

125ml buttermilk

Jams/curd/clotted cream to serve

NB: To make buttermilk, add 1 tbsp of lemon juice to 1 cup of milk and set aside for 10 minutes.

Method 

1. Pre-heat oven to 200C and line a baking tray with parchment paper. Measure flour and salt and sieve 3 times into a large bowl.
2. Add the chopped butter and rub it into the flour using your fingers to create a medium sized crumb texture. When rubbing the butter into flour, lift it to aerate the mixture. Do not over-mix.
3. Stir in the sugar.
4. Make a well in the middle of the flour mixture with a butter knife and pour in ¾ of the buttermilk. Using the knife, mix the flour with the buttermilk until it starts to form a soft, slightly sticky dough. Add more buttermilk if necessary.
5. Turn the dough out on to a lightly floured surface and knead the mixture 3-4 times until the cracks have disappeared.
6. Pat the dough gently to a thickness of 2-2.5cm. Dip the cutter into a bowl of flour, to prevent sticking. To cut the scones, press the cutter down firmly and quickly into dough. Don’t twist the cutter. As you press the cutter down, you will hear the dough giving a big sigh.
7. Gather trimmings and repeat step no.6.
8. Brush milk/leftover buttermilk on top of scones.
9. Bake for 10-12 minutes until risen and golden.
10. Serve immediately with jam, curd or clotted cream. Or all together!