Scones with mascarpone

I'm on a quest to find the perfect scone. I've tried recipes from various people - Delia, Mary Berry, Nigella etc but still haven't found one that really makes me feel - yes, that's it!
Trying out yet another recipe today, one I've made before, I decided to try using some mascarpone as well as milk to make it more moist. I also used soft light brown sugar instead of my usual caster sugar. Would this be my perfect scone?
Here's my adapted recipe:

340g sr flour
1 tspn baking powder
80g butter in pieces
2 tbpsn soft light brown sugar
80g mascarpone
90ml milk
1 beaten egg to glaze the tops

Preheat oven 190C/gas 6-7
I used a silicone mat on my baking sheet, but a dusting of flour on a sheet would be fine.

Put the flour, baking powder, butter and sugar in a food processor and blitz till breadcrumbs. Add the mascarpone and blitz for a couple of seconds. If you don't want to use a processor just rub the fat into the flour and sugar then rub in the mascarpone. Tip this mixture into a bowl, make a well and add the milk. Use a knife to mix and your hands to bring it all together. Don't overwork it.
Roll out gently to about 2 cm thick, then cut out rounds with a 6cm fluted or plain cutter.
Brush tops with the beaten egg and bake for 10-12 mins till golden and risen. Cool on a wire rack.

I was very happy with the result; they rose and had lovely golden colour.I just gently broke them apart and buttered them and added home made strawberry jam, but no cream! They were really soft and the brown sugar gave them a lovely taste, but they weren't too sweet. I'll certainly make them again, but my search for my perfect scone continues.

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Scones

I found some buttermilk hidden in the back of the fridge, so decided this was the time to try the buttermilk scones from Nigella's 'Kitchen'. They're quite generous, like the lady herself! You can find the recipe here.
They taste really good; a keeper I think.
Next time I'll add some dried fruit - cranberries, sour cherries, chopped dried apples or pears. Wonder what they'd taste like with chocolate pieces?!

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A Celebratory Cream Tea

We became the proud owners of a beautiful little black cat yesterday and to celebrate her arrival I decided a champagne cream tea was in order! I've been fancying a cream tea for a while - I think it's the first sign of sunshine that does that...the decadence of spending lazy summer afternoons eating light buttery scones with lashings of jam and cream. Apart from the cream I don't suppose a cream tea is particularly cat-friendly and there wasn't any sunshine to be had yesterday as the rain poured down in torrents. But it was certainly fairly decadent to be sitting around sipping champagne and eating these little beauties!

Now it seems that even something as simple as a cream tea can cause great debate... What flavour jam? What sort of cream? Cream or jam on first? How do you pronounce 'scone'? Fruit scone or plain scone?

Cream teas originated in Devon where it is customary to split a freshly baked scone, cover each half with Devonshire clotted cream and then spoon strawberry jam on top. It has to be a plain scone, proper clotted cream (none of your whipped cream nonsense) and strawberry jam. Sounds about right to me, but with one exception...tradition or not, I like to spread my jam on first and then I can spoon on as much clotted cream as my scone will take. I'd rather have just the one scone with serious artery clogging quantities of cream than two sparsely coated scones.

And so it was that we found ourselves eating cream teas, drinking champagne and feeding the cat clotted cream off a teaspoon on a cold and miserable Sunday afternoon in June.

Ingredients

8oz self raising flour
2oz butter
1oz caster sugar
1 egg
3fl oz milk
2 teaspoons baking powder

Method

Mix the flour and butter until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs and then add the sugar. Beat the egg, then add the milk to the egg and mix. Add the egg and milk mixture to the dry ingredients slowly and stir to form a soft dough. You might not need all of the egg and milk mixture so don't add it all at once. Kneed lightly and then roll out to around 2cm thickness on a floured work surface. Cut into 5cm rounds and put onto a greased baking tray. Brush the tops with milk and then bake in the oven at between 200C and 220C (depending on your oven) for around 15 minutes or until golden.

Leave to cool slightly and then serve with strawberry jam and clotted cream.

For the record, it's pronounced like gone (not bone)...

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