I am really passionate about scones. In fact, years ago a small story about one of my favourite memories of baking/cooking with Edmonds was printed in a special hard cover edition they were publishing at the time.
The recipe I chose was the scone recipe. My Dad, who has been gone for 19 years now, used to make scones all the time and the memory I shared was of standing on a stool “helping” him make them. Now I’m older, I must say that man had so much patience because I would get flour all over the place and was definitely more of a hindrance than a help. Still, I treasure the memory of it.
The Edmonds scone recipe is on page 35. I decided to make the plain recipe as well as the date version.
This recipe is very straight forward and easy to follow. The date version is a little more involved but it’s still easy and pretty hard to mess up.
You will notice that in this recipe you cut the mixture into 12 even pieces. Traditionally scones are not cut into shapes, which was a surprising thing to learn for me because my Dad would always cut them out using a glass, and so over the years I have done the same thing myself. Turns out my Dad was wrong but I am pretty sure they taste better cut out with a glass if you ask me lol!
One of the great things about scones is you can pretty much have a batch whipped up in around 20 minutes from start to finish, so they are great when you have unexpected guests.
You will notice the recipe states to cook them for 10 minutes but I have made this recipe for years and they take around 15 minutes to cook. If you cut one open after 10 minutes they are still sticky in the middle which is not ideal at all. If you bake them just that little bit longer you will have nice, light textured scones without the sticky middle.
The other thing I love about this recipe is it’s easy to experiment with. The Edmonds suggests cheese, date and sultana, but you could easily try other flavours like cheese and pineapple or bacon and onion or just experiment with different combinations. It’s a very forgiving recipe but be careful adding things with too much liquid as it can make the dough sticky and hard to work with. If this is the case, you can add a little extra flour until it’s easier to spread out.
It’s also a great recipe to use to make pinwheel scones. Like I said, just have a play with it.
So, I love this scone recipe and thoroughly recommend it. It’s also an awesome recipe to use to introduce children to cooking. Just be aware that there may be a little more mess than normal but the memories will be totally worth it. I promise.
Until next time. Happy cooking! 🙂