July 3, 2020July 14, 2020 by Tracy Cleland

Easy Scottish Cream Scones

Name: Easy Scottish Cream Scones
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 20 min
Ingredients: 2 cups flour; 1/3 cup sugar; 1 tbsp baking powder; 1/2 tsp salt; 6 tbsp butter (frozen); 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream (+2 tbsp to brush on top of unbaked scones); 1 egg (large); 1/2 tsp vanilla extract; coarse sugar ( to sprinkle on top of unbaked scones)

Have you ever wanted to make Scottish cream scones but were intimidated by the plethora of recipes out there? After a little research, combining several recipes together, I’ve come up with a super-easy recipes to help you make perfectly delicious Scottish cream scones.

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Why We Love Cream Scones

When the girls were younger, my mother would take us all to Rosepointe Cottage Tea Room in Chardon, Ohio, for lunch each spring. Mom invited me, my two sisters-in-law, and her three granddaughters along for the trip each year. We would meet her best friend, Sharon, and Sharon’s daughter and granddaughter there, making a group of ten. Lunch was always delicious, but we all looked forward to dessert. Often, we would order cream scones with jam and clotted cream.

Despite my Scottish ancestry, I’d never made scones. They just sounded intimidating. Mom and Dad even visited Scotland and brought me back a little cookbook called Traditional Scottish Cookery, but I still didn’t try. For me, scones were a once-a-year treat.

Finally I made up my mind that I was going to make scones no matter what. If they were good, we’d eat them. If they were bad, we’d throw them out (or feed them to the dogs–they eat anything). I cobbled together a list of ingredients from several different recipes, and to my surprise, ended up with amazingly delicious Scottish cream scones on my very first attempt.

How to Make Easy Scottish Cream Scones

Gather the ingredients

To start, gather your ingredients. I used two cups of flour, 1/3 cup of sugar, 1 tablespoon of baking powder, 1 teaspoon of salt, six tablespoons of frozen butter, 1 egg, 1 teaspoon of vanilla, and 1/2 cup plus two tablespoons of heavy whipping cream, along with coarse sugar to sprinkle on top.

If you have these eight ingredients, you can easily make Scottish cream scones.

I used regular all-purpose flour because that was what I had. I also used salted butter, but you could easily substitute unsalted butter. We almost always keep extra butter in the freezer, so it was easy to find frozen butter at our house. If you don’t have any in your freezer, just put some in the night before. We only use real butter at our house, so I don’t know if margarine would work the same way. I did use pure vanilla extract–once again, that’s all I buy.

Prepare to bake

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. While not completely necessary, I do this to minimize my clean up. I’ve sure that you could use a baking sheet with cooking spray or a baking stone with similar results.

Make your dough

Next, mix together the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt) in a large mixing bowl. Peel the paper off your frozen stick of butter, and grate six ounces of it (3/4 of the stick) into the bowl of dry ingredients using a hand grater.

You can use either salted butter or unsalted butter.

Use a hand grater to grate your frozen butter.Once the butter is grated into the flour mixture, stir so that the butter is coated with the dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, mix the heavy cream, vanilla, and egg well. Remember, you’ll want to work quickly so that your butter doesn’t warm up.

Use a whisk to quickly stir the wet ingredients.

After combining the wet ingredients, slowly pour them into the flour and butter mixtures, stirring as you go. Use a spoon instead of a whisk–the batter will stick up inside the whisk, so a spoon works much better.

Forming the scones

Scones were much easier to form than I thought they would be. Prepare a surface using flour. Form the dough into a rough shape, approximately one inch to one and a half inch high. Then, cut the dough into wedges, just like you would cut a pie.

Form the dough into a circle before cutting.

Your wedges don’t have to be even, as long as they are made with love. Be careful not to cut your surface–I used a butter knife to cut out my scones.

After placing your wedges on your prepared baking sheet, lightly brush them with a little heavy cream before sprinkling coarse sugar on top. Regular sugar will work if you don’t happen to have any coarse decorating sugar.

Baking your cream scones

Bake your scones at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for approximately 20 minutes or until the tops of the scones are light brown. After they are done, pull the scones out of the oven and let them cool completely.

Serving your scones

You can serve your scones with tea and jam or clotted cream. I love clotted cream, but I didn’t have any–I’ve never seen it in a store in the States. If you are interested in making your own clotted cream, just be aware that it takes a little time. Luckily, Aubree had sent some fresh homemade strawberry freezer jam, and it was the perfect accompaniment.

Storing the scones

If you are lucky and your scones aren’t gobbled up right away, you can store any extras in an air-tight container at room temperature or in the refrigerator for 3 or 4 days. You can freeze prepared scones, or even better, you can freeze unbaked scones as well. Just cut them out, slip them between slips or parchment paper, and place them in air-tight containers or Ziploc type freezer bags in the freezer. The best part is that you don’t even need to defrost these unbaked scones! Just unwrap them and pop them into the oven for a fresh-baked treat.