Scones

April 23 is St George's Day. I hadn't heard of it until a Londoner told me about it, but to my satisfaction I noticed I wasn't the only one so blase about it all. It barely seemed acknowleged around town, bar a miserly display of dragon-themed cards near the registers at Clinton's.

So what do a pair of inspired foodbloggers do? Create greater publicity with an international bake-off of English-themed pud.

Scones
Adapted from a recipe in The Cook's Companion by Stephanie Alexander

470g self-raising flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
100g butter
300ml milk soured with a squeeze of lemon juice
1/4 cup sultanas

Preheat oven to 220C and grease a baking tray.

Rub the softened butter into the flour and baking powder until it forms fine breadcumbs. Add the sultanas and coat thoroughly with the flour. Make a well in the centre and pour in most of the milk.

Slowly collapse flour walls into milk and combine. Add the rest of the milk if necessary, taking care not to unnecessarily overwork the mixture. The more you touch it, the tougher your scones will be.

Quickly turn out the mixture onto a lightly floured board. Press into a log shape and cut into 8-10 squares.

Place the squares close together on the baking tray and brushly lightly with milk.

Bake for 12-15 minutes and cool on a wire rack.

Enjoy fresh out of the oven. Lashings of butter, strawberry jam and clotted cream optional but highly recommended.

Technoratic tags: What's For Pud? and St George's Day