Anne Morgan You can make Delia Smith Devonshire scones with self-raising flour, butter, a little sugar and milk, and one batch gives about 12. Then you rub the butter into the flour, mix in the milk and bake the small rounds at 220°C until risen. Split and topped with strawberry jam and clotted cream, they make a proper cream tea that takes about 30 minutes.
Her Book of Cakes (1977) gives them this name, asking what could be more English than clotted cream, homemade strawberry jam and freshly made scones. She wants them slightly crisp on the outside and light and soft within. They are best eaten the day you bake them, though any left over can be warmed in the oven next day.
Years later, in Delia’s Cakes (2014), she made her plain scone recipe thicker, at 3cm, with 110ml of milk instead of 150ml. These earlier scones are rolled to just 2cm, so you get more of them from the same dough, which suits a big cream tea.
Delia Smith Devonshire Scones
Course: Afternoon TeaCuisine: BritishDifficulty: Easy12
servings15
minutes15
minutes165
kcalSmall, soft scones for splitting and filling with jam and clotted cream at tea-time.
Ingredients
- For the scones:
225g self-raising flour, sieved, plus a little extra
40g butter or margarine, at room temperature
1½ level tablespoons caster sugar
pinch of salt
150ml milk, plus a drop more if needed
- To serve:
butter
strawberry jam
100ml clotted cream, or 150ml double cream, whipped
Directions
- Oven: Heat the oven to 220°C, fan 200°C, gas mark 7. Grease a baking tin.
- Rub in: Rub the butter quickly into the sieved flour with your fingertips. Stir in the sugar, then a pinch of salt.
- Mix: Mix in the milk a little at a time with a knife. When it is all in, flour your hands and knead it to a soft dough. Add a drop more milk if it feels at all dry.
- Roll: Put the dough on a floured board and roll it out lightly with a floured rolling pin, to about 2cm thick.
- Cut: Cut out the scones with a 4.5cm cutter, fluted or plain, pushing it straight down without twisting. Knead the trimmings together and cut again.
- Bake: Set the scones on the greased tin and dust each one with flour. Bake near the top of the oven for 12 to 15 minutes, until risen and golden brown.
- Serve: Cool them on a wire rack and eat them as soon as you can, spread with butter, jam and clotted cream.
Notes
- Her book names Devon butter for spreading, alongside the jam and clotted cream.
FAQs
Does the jam or the cream go first on Devonshire scones?
Delia lists them in this order: Devon butter first, then jam, then clotted cream on top. So in her book the jam goes on before the cream, with a layer of butter underneath both.
She also says to eat the scones as soon as they are cool enough to handle. Split them then, while they still hold a little warmth, and the butter softens into them.
Can I use whipped cream instead of clotted cream?
Yes, Delia gives that swap herself: 150ml of double cream, whipped, in place of a 100ml carton of clotted cream. It makes a lighter topping for the jam.
Her How to Cook Book Two warns that over-whipped double cream turns grainy, so stop as soon as it looks thick. Adding a couple of tablespoons of milk to every 570ml of cream helps to prevent that.
How thick should Devonshire scones be?
Delia rolls this dough to about 2cm, gently, with flour on both the board and the pin. Then she stamps them out using a 4.5cm cutter, and she says it does not matter whether it is fluted or plain.
Tap the cutter sharply so it goes straight through the dough, and never twist it, or the scones will turn out a strange shape. Gather up what is left, knead it lightly and keep cutting until the dough is used up.
Can I make Devonshire scones without a cutter?
Yes, Delia’s own tip is to cut the dough into small triangles with a knife instead. It is a quicker way to use up all the dough at once, with no trimmings to re-roll.
Keep the dough at the same 2cm thickness and use a sharp knife, so the edges stay neat. They need the same baking time as the round ones.
Can I use margarine in Devonshire scones?
You can, because her Book of Cakes lists butter or margarine for these scones, as long as it is at room temperature. Soft fat rubs into the flour quickly with your fingertips, which is how she starts this dough and her treacle scones too.
Her later scones in Delia’s Cakes use spreadable butter instead. Her website says either spreadable or block butter works for those, and that salted or unsalted is your own choice.
