Making stuff 9: scones

We’ve had a spare hour this afternoon so it was time for large boy to work on part of his final badge for Beavers – cooking.

This is a really easy one for him because he loves cheese scones and we have a “go to” recipe that works really well. It’s out of the On Your Bike book by Chris Hoy that large boy got for a gift after reading the Flying Fergus books.

Recipe

• 250g self-raising flour
• 50g cold butter in cubes
• 75g grated mature cheddar
• 175ml milk

1. Heat the oven to gas 7/220°C and line a baking tray with baking paper.
2. Rub butter into flour then stir in cheese.
3. Add milk (often need a splash more, even after increasing the amount in the book from 125 to 172ml) and mix together.
4. Roll out to 2cm and cut into shapes.
5. Brush with more milk and sprinkle more grated cheese on top if you like.
6. Bake for 12-15mins or until golden.

We love these and often don’t wait for them to cool. This recipe does 8ish depending on how you cut them. Today large boy chose to do some huge and some small. They’ve come out gorgeous as usual.

Tips

I have this super cool tool for making pastry. When my fingers aren’t frozen they run rather warm so I inevitably melt the butter and my pastry come out dreadfully. So a few years ago I got a pastry blender thingy from Amazon (this one) and its brilliant!

Stir the cheese in a little bit at a time.

Try to avoid cutting them into different sizes. You end up with overdone little ones or underdone big ones or both.

If your child doesn’t want to be brave and take them out of the oven, don’t make them!