It’s the little things that keep you going.

It’s the little things that keep you going at a time like this.

My last post was al about the sort of baking which takes a few hours to complete and feels like quite a project. This time around it’s the quick and easy option, the sort of baking where you barely have time to do the washing up before the timer is going off and the kitchen smells wonderful.

There was a time when I would feel a bit guilty if there was always a baked sweet treat in the house. It felt as if when the weekend cake was finished, there should be a few abstemious mid weekdays before butter and sugar found their way back into my baking bowl. Coronavirus and the lockdown conditions it’s created have changed all that.

If I must stay at home and if I’m going to be denied coffeeshop visits the least I can ask for is a little something to nibble at with my coffee. I know it probably isn’t doing my waistline a great deal of good, I’ll worry about that when I can finally get out again. In the meantime, I’ll continue baking scones.

Scones are so adaptable, you can make them sweet or savoury, and once you’ve mastered the basics there’s an endless variety of things you can add.

My go-to recipe is about as straight forward as it gets and if you were to start now the scones would be ready in 30 minutes. Why not give it a go and brighten up your Wednesday afternoon. I use a 6cm cutter to make my scones and normally get half a dozen out of this recipe.

Ingredients

• 250g self-raising flour…you can make these with plain flour but self-raising gives much better results.
• a pinch of salt
• 50g caster sugar
• 50g unsalted butter – filled and diced
• 40g sultanas or raisins…any other dried fruit you have to hand will work if chopped up.
• 1 egg
• 100ml milk

Method

• Preheat the oven to gas mark 7 and line a baking sheet with parchment.
• Sift the flour, sugar and salt into a bowl. Add the butter and use your fingertip to work it into the dry mixture until it resembles bread crumbs. Then add the fruit and stir it in.
• Beat the egg into the milk and then pour into the dry mixture. Use a round-bladed knife to bring everything together to form a dough. Don’t worry if the dough is sticky, it’s meant to be. It helps if you rub some flour on your hand before you handle it.
• Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and use your hands to press the dough flat to about 3cm thick.
• Dip your cutter in some flour and then use it to cut rounds out of the dough. Transfer the rounds to the lined baking sheet.
• Sprinkle a little flour over the scones and then bake them for 12 minutes. They should be golden brown when ready.
• Transfer to a wire rack and leave to cool slightly.

They’re delicious on there own, even better if spread with butter and jam.