Cornwall, Day 33 (part one): Lemon and Blueberry

'Sconnoisseurs' 

The effort was a complete and utter success! Even without a written lemony recipe, this result was delectable. Our mothers would be proud.

You will recall that we left 'The Little Book of Scones' on a table at another cottage. And that we weren't given permission to retrieve it. And we still have not received permission. So last night we had to become creative and stick to our determination. We had the plain scone recipe, and most of the ingredients for it. My young guest was thinking of lemon zest. Lemon zest could add just the right zing! to our scones, and so we went for it. 

But guess what else we needed? Something we would certainly not require in the States: scales! Weighing scales must be found because we had no measuring cups and spoons and anyway, why bake American when you can do as the Brits do? This made sense.

To find the scales, my young friend decided to knock on cottage doors nearby, and enquire: Might you have a spare weighing scale, please? I think it was on the second cottage that the woman said, I might have one in here, I don't really know.. She looked in various cupboards, and came up trumps! Here are the scales: 

I could hardly believe it when she came back with them! Just the first of many happy successes this night.

And then, "Let's also put some blueberries in!" she enthused. So in went fresh blueberries. She did the mixing as I read out the recipe: 

Sweet Lemon Blueberry Scones

450g or 3 2/3 cup self-rising flour, plus some for dusting

175g or 1 1/2 sticks cold butter, cut into small lumps

2 large pinches of salt

75g or heaped 1/3 cup super fine sugar

1 teaspoon Bird's Custard Powder

2 large eggs

6 tablespoons buttermilk, plus some for brushing

*(to make these into Sweet Lemon Scones, we used 1 tablespoon of fresh lemon juice, and 5 of buttermilk, and added the zest of 4 lemons)

*Add fresh blueberries if desired.

Use your fingers to rub together flour, butter and salt in a bowl, until it resembles fine bread crumbs. Add sugar and custard powder. Whisk together the eggs and buttermilk until fluffy (this helps them to rise nicely). Combine liquids with flour mixture until smooth. We had no rolling pin, so we placed the dough onto a floured surface, patting it into a circle approximately 1 1/4 inches thick. Cut scones in circles (we used a coffee mug!), placing them onto a floured baking sheet, brushing with an egg mixture or buttermilk. 

Bake at 190C, or 375F until golden brown, approximately 20 minutes. Voila! 

The SconeLady and daughter-of-Rosie 

make scones!

Perhaps best of all is this: the lady who lent us her scales was given TWO SWEET LEMON BLUEBERRY SCONES of her own! She was happy and surprised, and perhaps glad she had helped out these two strangers.

With the jam and clotted cream, our day was made complete. We hope you will try this recipe! It is a perfect combination of Grace Hall's basic sweet scone recipe, with some intriguing additions. 

Superb!

See you along the way!

the SconeLady

Cornwall beach, Easter Sunday