How to make Perfect Scones

Perfect, easy scones in 20 minutes flat. Great for afternoon tea or breakfast!

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

How to make Scones
Freshly Baked Scones

How to make perfect Scones? How to pronounce Scones?! I say it rhyming with cone but here in the UK, it is just as, if not more common to say it rhyming with gone. Take your pick. This is one of those super quick recipes that my kids love to put together in the afternoons when they’re bored or are feeling hungry and there’s nothing exciting to eat. 20 minutes from start to end – even a kid has enough patience for that!

The image above shows you my favourite way of eating scones, with clotted cream and jam, preferably raspberry jam, strawberry comes a close second! When made right, they’re fairly light and crumbly and can be a bit of a mess to eat!

Scones can be made with eggs and without. I give you both recipes here and will let you decide which you prefer. I have a preference for the scones with eggs (they are richer) but as my girls are allergic to eggs, we make the egg free ones just as often.

How to Make Perfect Scones

Flour – I use self raising flour, never use bread flour, it is too strong and will not give you that light, airy texture. Pasta flour (00) can be quite good too, giving you light airy scones, but of course you’ll have to increase the amount of baking powder.

Keep the dough soft – a soft scones dough is better than a dry one, it’ll give you a better rise and the cooked texture will be softer. Err on the side of caution. You can always sprinkle a touch of flour as well as dust your cutters with flour, if your dough is too sticky.

Do not knead the dough – another easy key to making perfect scones is to remember to work as little as you can with the dough. The less you handle it, the better the rise. Seriously. We’ve tested this in our kitchen. We kneaded one half of the dough once and the resulting scones were flat-ish and hard.

Rolling pin or pat down – I’m definitely a “pat the dough down with your hands” kinda girl. The less work the dough gets, the better, as above.

How to Eat Scones?

Warm, straight out of the oven, but do let them cool lightly, don’t burn yourself! Next day scones are not as soft and airy. So what I do when we have leftover scones, is I halve them and pop them in the toaster or place them under the grill – very yummy!

With butter, clotted cream, jam, lemon curd, marmalade, take your pick! Incidentally, I occasionally make my own clotted cream, a very easy but time consuming process. When I do, I use the leftover cream and milk mix to make our scones, resulting in a richer taste and slightly heavier texture.

Savoury Scones

You can even make them savoury to go with stews. There is an old Eurasian beef stew called Eurasian Beef Smore from Singapore that used to call for broken up scones in it before serving. Click on the name above for the recipe, if you’re interested.

You can use scones instead of bread to go with stews, or top stews with them instead of dumplings. Just omit the sugar and add some salt, chopped herbs, etc. Of course, you can make cheese scones, blueberry scones, etc but those are all posts for another day! Enjoy the recipes below and do let me know with a comment how you get on if you try the recipe.

Now, let’s get our aprons on!

If you like the recipe and article, don’t forget to leave me a comment and that all important, 5-star rating! Thank you!

And if you make the recipe, share it on any platform and tag me @azlinbloor, and hashtag it #linsfood.

Lin xx

How to make the Perfect Scones

Perfect, easy scones in 20 minutes flat. Great for afternoon tea or breakfast!
5 from 12 votes
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Course: Desserts
Cuisine: British
Prep Time: 8 minutes
Cook Time: 10 minutes
Total Time: 18 minutes
Servings: 12 scones
Calories: 115kcal
Author: Azlin Bloor

Ingredients

With Egg

  • 250 g self raising flour
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 40 g salted butter
  • 1 Tbsp caster superfine sugar
  • 1 pinch salt
  • 125 ml milk
  • 1 large egg lightly beaten
  • extra flour for dusting in a small bowl

Egg Free

  • 250 g self raising flour
  • 1 Tbsp caster superfine sugar
  • pinch salt
  • 80 g salted butter
  • 125 ml milk
  • extra flour for dusting

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F.
  • Sift the flour and baking powder into a large bowl.
  • Rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips until it resembles breadcrumbs.
  • Add the sugar and salt and gently mix with your fingertips again.
  • In a measuring jug, mix the milk and egg lightly with a fork, don’t create too many bubbles.
  • Place 3 tablespoons of this egg/milk mixture in a bowl, and set it aside for glazing the scones later.
  • Gradually pour the milk/egg mix into the flour mix and stir gently with a wooden spoon until you get a soft dough. You might not need all of it.
  • Turn the whole thing out onto a lightly floured surface, and flatten it out, either using your hands or a rolling pin, to a thickness of about 2cm (just under an inch).
  • Use your cookie cutter to cut out as many scones as you can, then place them on your baking sheets.
  • Using your pastry brush, spread some of the milk/egg mix onto each of the scones.
  • Bake for 10-12 minutes, until the tops are a lovely golden brown.
  • Let them cool slightly before eating.

Eggless

  • Just mix as above, but without the egg stage.

Nutrition

Calories: 115kcal | Carbohydrates: 17g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 4g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 1g | Monounsaturated Fat: 1g | Trans Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 22mg | Sodium: 37mg | Potassium: 74mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 2g | Vitamin A: 120IU | Calcium: 32mg | Iron: 1mg
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10 thoughts on “How to make Perfect Scones”

  1. These do indeed look most perfect! Am now yearning for warm scones – nothing better! Thanks for joining in with #BakeoftheWeek – Roundup and linky now open x

  2. Great scone-making tips! I thought I knew how to make scones, but the flour hint is a new one for me. I’ll have to try making them with some pasta flour. xx

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