Scones and Devonshire teas

"Every scone maker aspires to the towering triumphs of the soufflé – the miraculous transformation of lumpen flour and fat into a billowing cloud of fluffy dough – but all too often ends up with stubbornly flat biscuits instead." Felicity Cloake

Sincere apologies if I have written all this before. As I was researching I felt sure I had done this before, though I cannot find a post on the subject of scones. Maybe I mentioned some of it when I was doing crème fraiche. Anyway I am having another go because on Sunday we did the Dandenongs with our guests and stopped for a late lunch at the Kallista Tea Rooms, where I had a Devonshire tea with the most beautiful fluffy and light (and warm) scones.

Kallista is not as well visited as Olinda and Sassafras, and so we were able to park and also find a table. Lovely food - my fellow guests, had a beautiful chicken soup, a decadently rich looking chocolate cake and some fruity pancakes. So if you are up in the Dandenongs I recommend it.

But back to Devonshire teas. I notice that the picture at the top of the page has jam first and cream on top, which I think is how I did it, but I gather it actually depends whether you follow the folk from Devon or Cornwall. Apparently I followed Cornwall tradition. In Devon it's cream first followed by jam. It should also only be strawberry jam. If you are traditional that is. Me I chose the mixed berry jam which was also extremely nice, and I'm pretty sure that you can really have any kind of jam you like. And although it is also supposed to be clotted cream, you can't really get clotted cream here in Australia - so goodby to tradition. Mind you it is absolutely a tradition to have a Devonshire tea up in the Dandenongs which have a very British air about them - well in the shops and the cafés and the names of the houses and places. Which I think must come from the fact that the early settlers of Melbourne would often spend the summer up in the hills which were cooler. Maybe they didn't worry about the fire risk!

I couldn't find out much about the history of the scone. The name either comes from the Dutch schoonbrot which means beautiful bread, or from Scottish Gaelic sgon meaning a shapeless mass or large mouthful. Then, of course, there is the stone of Scone - on which the Scottish kings were crowned - and which was 'stolen' by the English and is now under the throne in Westminster Abbey. There is an interesting article in the New York Times about the origins of scones and where to find the best ones in Scotland. Most people do seem to agree that it is indeed a Scottish thing.

Originally the scone was round and flat (a large flat plate size) and made from unleavened oats and baked on a griddle. Then came leavening agents and it evolved into the scone we know today. Felicity Cloake, in her How to Make the Perfect Scone article explains all the various ways to make scones rise. Take your pick I say. I remember having some excellent scones at one of our very local vineyards, which the lady of the vineyard maintained she made with lemonade - and you can find lots of recipes on the net for lemonade scones.

"The honest scone has no sugary icing or exotically-perfumed ganache to hide behind – it stands or falls on its absolute freshness, which is why it's impossible to purchase a good example on the high street. Twee tearooms are similarly unreliable, because scones should be enjoyed straight from the oven, with only the briefest of pauses for the requisite toppings"

Devonshire teas are, I think, a rather more recent invention - like the early 20th, late 19th centuries, when fashionable ladies would gather for tea and cakes in the late afternoon. This is a tradition which continues in places such as the Windsor Hotel here in Melbourne or the Hopetoun Tea Rooms - or indeed all over the Dandenongs. And today, when we went to the Royal Botanical Gardens, what should their café have on the menu but a Devonshire tea - which one of my companions chose. Though, of course, in this day and age you could have coffee rather than tea with your scones - which I (and he) did too.

I don't make sweet scones very often - indeed I cannot remember the last time I did, but I do make some savoury scones. And there are countless recipes for these - I think I'll save that for another time, because there are endless variations on a theme there.

So Devonshire teas - genteel, delicious and just a tiny bit decadent! Nostalgic.