Irish scones at an English Tea

The scones were the hit of the tea party. I did not expect that, and I felt very grown up that I actually pulled it off. On the second batch, anyway.

I have a marvelous cookbook called “Avoca Cafe Cookbook” from Avoca Weavers, who make the most amazing things (throws and clothes and such) in their shop in Wicklow. Many years ago they set up a café to provide some tasty treats for its customers. The café has an extremely high reputation in Ireland for serving fabulous, delicious, Irish food, and I was excited when they produced a cookbook. The only drawback in my household is that Wan is lactose intolerant and I’ve become a vegetarian, so some of the recipes will never get made in my kitchen, but oh! the ones that do…

Anyway, I decided to make the scones in the book. If you ever buy a cookbook from the British Isles, you will find most of the ingredients listed by weight, not volume. I have no idea how many cups a pound of self-rising flour is, but I do know it weighs 450 grams…

"Please Read All Instructions Before Proceeding"

The thing I missed with the first batch, however, was the line “roll out to 1 inch thickness.” Remember muffin tops? Well, I have created scone tops. Both Wan and I agree that they are great, especially heated up and with a cup of tea (they are scones, after all), but I could not serve it to my guests. Second time’s a charm, although I didn’t quite roll them out to one inch, but still, they looked like scones and tasted like scones, and everyone oohed and ahhed over them (note: do not try to create round scones with, say, a white wine glass. You’ll be able to cut them all right, but you won’t be able to get them out of the glass.)

Major Shopping Expedition

I had to go to Plymouth (yes, the Pilgrim’s Plymouth) to get the clotted cream. There were one or two places in Boston I could’ve gone to to get it, but parking in town can be a pain, so I drove the 35 miles to Plymouth, partly to listen to my new audio book about John Quincy Adams.

The only mistake I made with the clotted cream was that I bought three jars. Clotted cream is the quintessential condiment for scones, and I was not going to run out. However, I needed less than one, even for my 16 ladies, even for my 24 scones. Clotted cream is very thick, completely un-pourable, and surprisingly little was needed. Now, what to do with 2 ½ jars of clotted cream…

I can make that dish in three minutes – NOT!!

A realistic timetable

“Little sandwiches” does not mean “little work”

I’ll have one of those, one of those, and one of those (please)

How ‘bout a cuppa?

Thanks so much for coming

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