Making Fruit Scones with a Light Crumb

Start with the Crumb You Want

A good fruit scone should break open with a soft, even crumb that pulls apart rather than crumbles into dust. That texture comes from three things: cold fat, a light hand, and a hot oven. Get those right and everything else - the sultanas, the jam, the clotted cream - simply follows.

British scones are not cakes and they are not bread. They sit somewhere in between, leaning on self-raising flour and a quick rise rather than yeast. This means the whole process is fast, which is precisely why so many people get it wrong. The dough should be handled for minutes, not kneaded for ten. If you treat it gently, it rewards you.

The Short Ingredient List and What Each Part Does

For a standard batch of eight to ten scones you will need:

• 350g self-raising flour, plus extra for dusting. Check the date on the packet - older flour rises weakly.
• 1 level tsp baking powder, a small insurance policy against a flat batch.
• 75g cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes and kept in the fridge until the last moment.
• 40g caster sugar. Fine sugar dissolves quickly into the dough.
• 75g sultanas. If they feel hard, soak them in warm milk for ten minutes and pat dry.
• 150ml milk, plus a little extra for glazing. Buttermilk or milk with a squeeze of lemon works beautifully and gives a slightly more tender crumb.
• A pinch of fine salt to stop the whole thing tasting sweet and dull.

Two optional touches: a quarter teaspoon of mixed spice if you like a hint of warmth, and a beaten egg for glazing if you want a deeper, glossier top. Milk gives a softer, paler crust.

Rubbing In: Cold Hands, Quick Fingers

Tip the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar into a large bowl and stir them together with a fork. Add the cold butter and rub it in using only your fingertips - not your palms, which are too warm. Lift the mixture, rub the pieces between your thumbs and fingers, and let it fall back into the bowl.

Work until the mixture looks like fine breadcrumbs with no lumps of butter left larger than a pea. This takes three or four minutes. If the butter starts to soften and smear, stop, put the bowl in the fridge for ten minutes, and carry on. Cold butter creates little pockets of steam as it melts in the oven, and those pockets are what lift the scone.

Stir the sultanas through now, so the fruit is coated in flour rather than clumped at the bottom.

Bringing the Dough Together Without Beating It

Pour in most of the milk and bring everything together with a round-bladed knife or a fork, cutting through the mixture rather than stirring it. Add the last of the milk a tablespoon at a time. You are looking for a soft, slightly shaggy dough that just clears the sides of the bowl - it should not be sticky enough to cling to your fingers.

Turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and fold it two or three times, pressing it flat and folding it over. That is all the "kneading" a scone needs. Anything more develops gluten and gives you a tough, bready result. Pat the dough to a thickness of about 3cm. If it feels warm and soft, chill it for fifteen minutes.

Cutting, Glazing and the Hot Bake

Heat the oven to 220°C (200°C fan, gas mark 7) and put a baking tray in to warm. Cut out your scones using a 6cm cutter dipped in flour, pressing straight down without twisting. Twisting seals the edges and stops the rise. Gather the offcuts lightly, press them together, and cut again - these second-round scones will be slightly less neat, but perfectly good.

Place them on the hot tray, spaced a couple of centimetres apart so they can spread and rise freely, and brush the tops with milk or beaten egg. Avoid letting the glaze run down the sides, which can stick the scones to the tray.

Bake for 10 to 12 minutes until well risen and golden brown. They should sound slightly hollow when tapped underneath. Cool on a rack for a few minutes, then wrap them in a clean tea towel while they are still warm. The trapped steam softens the crust and keeps the crumb tender.

Serving, Storing and Salvaging

Split scones with your hands or a fork rather than a knife, which compresses the crumb. Serve them slightly warm with good raspberry or strawberry jam and a generous spoonful of clotted cream - jam first or cream first is your business, and both have their defenders.

To keep them: eat on the day of baking for the best texture. For the next day, refresh them in a low oven for five minutes, wrapped in foil, and they will come back to life. Freeze any extras on the day, well wrapped, and thaw them at room temperature rather than in the microwave, which turns them rubbery.

If a batch comes out flat, the usual suspects are warm butter, too much liquid, or an oven that never quite reached temperature. If they are dry, you have worked in too much flour or overbaked them. Both are easy to fix next time, and next time is always soon enough for another batch of scones.