Lavender Scones with Whipped Honey and Seal Salt Butter | Brambly Hedge, The High Hills

The mice ate their picnic and enjoyed the late autumn sunshine but soon it was time to go on.
Brambly Hedge | The High Hills
Jill Barklem

I like to think that these lavender scones and butter would be the perfect thing to take along on a tiny mice picnic, to eat in the sun with a cup of tea poured from a tiny thermos.

I instead ate them on a weekend while drinking endless cups of tea! Of course. A close friend of mine sent me a package of amazing goodies recently, including some dried lavender from his and his partner’s garden. This is the first thing I’ve made with it but I’m so very keen to do syrup for iced lattes and many other things!

Lavender Scones with Whipped Honey and Sea Salt Butter
Makes approx. 9 scones
Ingredients
Scones
1/2 tbsp dried lavender
1/2 cup raw caster sugar
375g plain flour
1.5 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp bi-carb soda
115g butter, cold
230ml milk + 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
Sea salt
Butter
2 tbsp honey
100g butter
Sea Salt

Scones

1. Preheat the oven to 200C and line a large baking sheet with baking paper.

2. Combine the milk and apple cider vinegar and set to the side to curdle into butter milk.

3. Using a grinder combine the sugar and lavender and grind until even and fragrant - I used a small blender to do this but have also used a mortar and pestle before, it just took a bit longer.

4. In a medium sized bowl tip in the lavender sugar, flour, bi-carb soda, baking powder, and a pinch of salt - mix until combined. Add int he cold butter and use your fingers to rub it into the flour until it resembles wet sand.

5. Make a well in the middle and pour in the butter milk, stirring with a wooden spoon until it is just combined.

6. Tip the dough onto a lightly floured surface, it will be quite soft, use your hands to gather it up and give it a few folds until you can bring it together to form a 1 inch thick mound. Use a round cutter, or a glass if needed, to stamp out as many scones as you can. Re-roll the scraps and repeat!

7. Place the scones onto the prepared baking tray in rows, letting them almost touch (this will encourage them to ride upwards instead of outwards!). I brushed the tops of mine with a bit of extra milk.

8. Bake for 15 - 18 minutes or until they are a light golden brown. Remove from the oven and let cool a little before serving with the honey and salt butter.

Whipped Honey and Sea Salt Butter

1. In the bowl of a stand mixer (if you have one! Otherwise you can also do this with a whisk, it just takes a bit more elbow grease) place your butter and beat until it is smooth and fluffy.

2. Slowly drizzle in the honey while beating it and 1 - 2 tsp of sea salt, depending how salty you like it!

3. Scrape the butter into a container and refrigerate before serving with scones. enjoy!

Apple and Blackberry Pudding | A Winter Story, Brambly Hedge

'Is that you, dear?' called Mrs Apple as he let himself in through the front door. Delicious smells wafted down from the kitchen. Mrs Apple had spent the afternoon baking pies, cakes and puddings for the cold days to come.
Winter Story, Brambly Hedge
Jill Barklem

I’m writing this entry while firmly wrapped in a blanket with a hot water bottle tucked up under my feet. It’s officially winter here and my favourite time of the year. There’s nothing better to me than walking home from work, headphones on and hood up, as the rain drizzles around me. I adore being able to spend my days inside with endless pots of tea and soft music filling the air. Being able to keep the balcony doors open as the rain pours down just outside, and that utterly lovely smell of fresh, clean rain spreads through the air.

Anyway, I really enjoy winter.

The Brambly Hedge books are a memory from my childhood that I think will always have a space in my mind. Growing up in the middle of the Australian bush, I remember wishing desperately that I could build a tiny home in a tree stump and have my days spent baking pies and jams for the native mice. Much like the mice within Brambly Hedge, stocking up a tiny larder for the colder months, with a fire warming the rooms.

Alas, I moved to a city, to a tiny apartment. Instead I’m spending my winter days making stews, soups and puddings to combat the cold. The below apple and blackberry pudding is one such, it’s got enough fruit that it feels somewhat healthy (…sure), while also being delicious. The recipe comes from Julia Busuttil Nishimura’s cookbook, A Year of Simple Family Food. I’ve changed the recipe slightly to be plant-based.

Apple and Blackberry Pudding
Ingredients
3 Granny Smith apples, peeled and cored
300g blackberries, frozen or fresh
1 tsp vanilla paste
1 lemon, zested and juiced
100g raw caster sugar
100g butter
50ml milk
2 tsp No Egg, mixed with 4 tbsp water
150g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
To Serve
1 tbsp melted butter
1 tbsp raw caster sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
Cream or ice cream

1. Preheat the oven to 190C, and grease a baking dish with butter.

2. Slice the cored and peeled apples thinly and place into a bowl along with the lemon juice and vanilla paste. Toss to combine, add in the blackberries and fill the prepared baking dish with the mixed fruit.

3. Cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl until pale and fluffy. Add in the no egg and water and mix together. Stir the milk in, and then add the lemon zest and flour, mixing until the batter is smooth.

4. Spread the batter over the fruit, smoothing it across. Bake for approx. 45 minutes or until the top is a golden brown.

5. 5 minutes before the pudding is ready to come out, combine the cinnamon and raw caster sugar together. When the pudding is done and removed from the oven brush the top with the melted butter and sprinkle the cinnamon sugar over the top. Serve with cream or ice cream. Enjoy!

Mulled Wine | Brambly Hedge

Mr Apple and Dusty Dogwood headed the procession, lanterns held high.
‘Roast the chestnuts, heat the wine,
‘Pass the cups along the line,
‘Gather round, the log burns bright,
‘It’s warm as toast inside tonight,’
‘Sang the mice as the log came into view.’
The Secret Staircase (Brambly Hedge)
Jill Barklem

My childhood was spent mainly in middle of the bush in country Victoria. The house I grew up in was surrounded by towering gum trees, with paths throughout them clotted with ferns, wattle trees and numerous rabbit, potoroo and bush mice holes that were waiting to trip someone up.

A childhood pastime was to construct tiny houses outside, beneath the overhanging moss on a garden path or within the hollow of a tree that I’d stumbled over. I still enjoy seeing such houses tucked away throughout Melbourne, where I now live. Neighbours whose children have created little faerie or gnome doors built into the sides of trees or bottle tops hanging from branches (so faeries can swing on them - as a young girl solemnly told me when she saw me admiring them).

Brambly Hedge was a children’s book that let my childhood imagine run wild with theories of how all the animals I saw were living when I wasn’t looking. And how apparently they were all incredible cooks. Rose jam? Oat cakes with rowanberry jam? Syllabub and three tiered wedding cakes? Yes please.

I was gifted a copy of The Complete Brambly Hedge for Christmas this year and with my recent page flick through it - my eyes landed very solidly on song above. More specifically - heat the wine. It’s winter in Melbourne, and it seems to just be rapidly getting colder with icy and biting mornings and nights abound. One speciality that Melbourne seems to do particularly well is mulled wine. Every bar appears cosy and inviting with the scent of cinnamon, oranges and various spices drifting out of the doorway. Promising warmth, comfort and a drink that, honestly, feels like a hug.

On the days when my wallet is low and it’s far too hard to put clothes on that aren’t pyjamas I’ve taken to perfecting my own mulled wine recipe. A lot of the stuff in it is quite interchangeable and it’s super fun to play around with the recipe and get a flavour that you really enjoy.

*Note: A fruity wine is best - but honestly, anything is going to taste pretty great when you cook ti with fruit and spices for ages. 

Mulled Wine
Serves approx. 12 cups
Ingredients
2 x bottle of red wine *see note
2 tsp fresh grated nutmeg
2 cinnamon sticks
10 star anise
2 tsp cloves
1 1/2 cup apple juice
1 apple, chopped into largish chunks
1 orange
1/2 cup brandy *optional

1. Using a sharp knife, very carefully cut away the zest of the orange until you have around 4-5 strips. The remainder of the orange can be sliced up thinly to be used in the wine later.

2. Place all the spices, the strips of orange zest and the apple juice into a large saucepan and heat on medium until lightly simmering.

3. Add in the chunks of apple, orange slices and both bottles of wine.

4. Leave it to remain on a medium heat - you don’t want it to burn. When the wine begins to simmer and the scent of the spices being to drift from the saucepan you’ll know its ready.

5. If you decide to pop some brandy in - do it around this point, and leave it to heat in the wine for another few minutes.

6. You can either strain all the wine into a new saucepan if you’re planning to have it all at once - or simply strain it off glass by glass (it doesn’t do it any harm with the spices remaining in it). Enjoy hot!