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!

Scones | Rebecca

Those dripping crumpets, I can see them now. Tiny crisp wedges of toast, and piping hot, floury scones. Sandwiches of unknown nature, mysteriously flavoured and quite delectable, and that very special gingerbread.
Rebecca
Daphne du Maurier

I have faint memories of picking Rebecca up from the school library shelves when I was in high school - I was quite an ambitious reader at the time, trying to work my way through such classics as Moby Dick (inspired by part from my love of Gilmore Girls I'm pretty sure, I would write down whatever book it was that Rory happened to be reading in an episode). I do faintly remember enjoying Rebecca, but if someone had asked me what the plot of it was in years since then I would have struggled to name anything outside of - dead wife, big house...mean lady? Like many I'm sure, I picked up the book again with the recent release of the Netflix trailer of the adaptation of the story.

I'd forgotten, I think, just how haunting the tale was. The words seem to bring about any memory of feeling like an outsider, and alone - keeping the reader in a state an anxiety almost the entire way through. I finished it only recently, fighting sleep and hurriedly devouring the last few pages before closing them - no one I know has read it recently, but I have the overpowering urge and need to discuss it with someone, to admire the characters and make noises about the wicked Mrs Danvers.

I've made crumpets already, and ginger bread. I haven't however yet tried my hand at scones. Being Australian, the classic British scone is something I've grown up with. A common delicacy at most school bake sales or afternoons at Nanna's, usually served with jam and cream. The recipe is quite simple - the biggest mistake will leave you with flat scones, but honestly, cover them with butter and jam and it will still be incredible tasty anyway.

Scones
Makes approx. 10 - 12
Ingredients
400g self raising flour
100g butter
100g raw caster sugar
1tsp baking powder
185ml milk
1tsp maple syrup
1 tbsp milk
Salt

1. Preheat oven at 220C. Combine the flour, baking powder and a pinch of salt in a owl. Add in the butter and rub in with your finger tips until it resembles wet sand. Add in the raw caster sugar.

2. Pour the milk over the top of the butter and flour mixture, combining until it comes together into a ball of dough - try not to knead it too much during this time otherwise they will not rise properly.

3. You can split the dough into two parts or keep it as one for this next stage. Press the dough down onto a lightly floured surface, using your hand to press it down till it is only around 3cm thick.

4. Prepare a baking tray with baking paper. Press a scone cutter, or the rim of a glass (Whatever you're using to cut your cones out) into flour and press down hard into the dough, pulling out the prepared scone onto the baking tray. Repeat the process with the remaining dough, bringing the scraps together until you run out of dough.

5. Combine the 1 tbsp milk and maple syrup, using a pastry brush glaze the tops of the raw scones with the mixture before placing them into the oven. Bake for 10 - 12 minutes or until the tops are golden. Enjoy hot, with butter and jam and of, course, tea!