The Scone at the Centre of the Tea Table

No tea table feels properly dressed without a plate of scones. Whether you are laying a starched linen cloth over a mahogany parlour table, setting out a three-tier stand beside a china teapot, or simply pulling two chairs up to the kitchen dresser, the warm scone is the quiet heart of the occasion. It is a humble thing, made from little more than flour, butter and buttermilk, yet it carries the whole ceremony on its shoulders. Get it right and everything around it, the jam, the clotted cream, the second pot of Assam, seems to fall into place.

The method below is deliberately plain. It is the sort of recipe that would have been written out in a notebook and kept in a drawer, and it rewards care rather than cleverness. Light hands, cold ingredients and a hot oven will do more for your scones than any expensive equipment.

Ingredients Worth Getting Right

Before you begin, weigh everything out and have it ready. Scone dough does not appreciate being kept waiting while you hunt for the baking powder.

• 450g plain flour, plus a little extra for dusting. If you use self-raising, add only one teaspoon of baking powder.
• Three level teaspoons of baking powder and half a teaspoon of fine salt.
• 75g cold butter, cut into cubes, or coarsely grated from the fridge. Cold is the whole point; warm butter makes heavy scones.
• 50g caster sugar. Add a further tablespoon if you like them on the sweeter side.
• About 250ml buttermilk, straight from the fridge. This is the ingredient that gives the faint tang and the tender crumb.
• One egg, beaten with a tablespoon of milk, for glazing.

If buttermilk is not to hand, stir a tablespoon of lemon juice into 250ml of whole milk and leave it for ten minutes until it looks slightly thickened. Thinned natural yoghurt works well too. What you are after is acidity, which reacts with the baking powder and lifts the scones as they bake.

The Method: Light Hands, Cold Butter

Heat the oven to 220°C, 200°C with a fan, or gas mark 7, and line a heavy baking tray with parchment. Put the tray in the oven to warm while you work, though do not let it scorch.

• Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a wide bowl. Tip in any bran left in the sieve.
• Add the cold butter and rub it in lightly with your fingertips, lifting the mixture as you go, until it resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Alternatively, grate frozen butter into the flour and toss it through with a knife.
• Stir in the sugar. Make a well in the centre and pour in most of the buttermilk.
• Bring the dough together with a round-bladed knife, adding the remaining buttermilk a spoonful at a time only if it is genuinely dry. It should be soft and slightly shaggy, not wet.
• Turn out onto a floured surface and fold it over two or three times, just enough to gather it. Do not knead. Kneading develops gluten and gives you something closer to a rock cake.
• Pat, do not roll, to a thickness of about 3cm. Cut with a 5cm fluted cutter, pressing straight down and lifting without twisting. Twisting seals the edges and stops the rise. Gather the trimmings, re-pat and cut again, handling as little as possible.

Into the Oven and Onto the Stand

Brush the tops only with the beaten egg. If glaze runs down the sides it will glue the scones to the tray and hold back their rise. Leave a good 3cm between each one.

Bake for twelve to fifteen minutes, until they are well risen, golden on top and sound hollow when tapped underneath. Resist opening the oven door in the first ten minutes. Lift them onto a wire rack and cover with a clean tea towel while they cool a little; the trapped steam keeps the crust soft rather than brittle. Scones are at their best within an hour of leaving the oven, and they are never better than when still faintly warm.

Jam, Cream and the Order of Things

Split each scone with your fingers or a knife, never saw through it, and set the two halves side by side on a plate. Then comes the question that has divided households for a century. In Cornwall, a spoonful of strawberry jam goes on first and the clotted cream sits on top. In Devon, the cream is spread thickly and the jam follows. Both are correct, and both are delicious. Use a generous hand with the cream; a thin scraping is a sadness.

Serve on a tiered stand if you have one, with the scones on the bottom plate and small dishes of jam and cream alongside. A pot of strong tea, poured through a strainer into thin china, completes the picture.

A Few Details Worth Knowing

• Flat, spreading scones usually mean warm butter, over-handling or an oven that was not hot enough.
• Dry, crumbly scones generally want a little more buttermilk, added by the spoonful.
• Unbaked cut scones freeze beautifully. Open-freeze them, then bag them and bake from frozen, adding three or four minutes to the time.
• Day-old scones can be split, buttered and warmed in a low oven, which is a fine thing on a wet Sunday afternoon.

Set the table, put the kettle on and eat them while the butter and cream are still melting.