Quick Scones

I've just looked at the weather forcast, and the lovely weather we've been enjoying lately is all set to change. It's going down from 23 degrees to 12 tomorrow, so we will have to make the most of today's lovely sun, and spend the day in the garden, and not too much time faffing about indoors.

So quick cream tea...
 I've posted my traditional scone recipe before, but I've made some today and as I was in a bit of a rush to get out in the garden, and my flour supplies are not what I'd  ideally like, I used up some self raising flour that I had spare and it seems to have worked well so here's the recipe.

As I've also said before, scones are quick and easy to make, and if you keep some of my freezer raspberry jam in your freezer, and some cream in the fridge, clotted is best,  you can pretty much have an instant cream tea.

Quick Scones - 
For light scones work as fast as you can and handle as little as possible. Start to finish 10 mins max.

1 lb/500 gr self raising flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
3 oz 75gr caster sugar
3- 4 oz75-100gr soft butter
half a pint of milk

1 Switch on the oven 180 degees.
2 Put first four ingredients in large bowl and rub in until like breadcrumbs
3 Stir in milk and form a rough wet dough
4 Turn onto floured surface, Dredge with more flout and pat down to a thick slab
5 Cut out with cutter or just into squares with a knife.
6. Bake 10 - 15 minutes until lightly browned.

We haven't got any clotted cream at the moment** but we do have some good double cream from our local village shop so we used that, together with my raspberry freezer jam which being uncooked has a lovely fresh fruit flavour, this is how you make it -

Freezer Raspberry Jam

1 lb/ 500gr raspberries lightly crushed
2 kg caster sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
half a bottle of Certo

Add the sugar to the fruit and leave for a few hours for sugar to fully dissolve.
Add the Certo and stir continuously for 2 minutes
Add the lemone juice and stir for another 2 minutes
Leave to stand at room temperature overnight.
Ladle into small containers. Jam will gradually thicken over next day or so, when fully set store in freezer.
This jam keeps for ages and thaws out very quickly and is perfect for cream teas as it is quite soft set and can be easily ladled on top of clotted cream Devon style. The recipe shouldn't take you more than ten minutes to make and ten minutes to bake, (and ten minutes to scoff!!)

**Of course if you've got your own Jersey cow as I have, you have really no excuse for not having a ready supply of clotted cream. However, as I've discussed with my cow keeping friend Sally, there's a bit of a knack to making it, and getting it just right. I should practise more....