Recipe: Mini Rosemary & Cheddar Cheese Scones

So, yesterday, I found myself watching repeats of the Great British Bakeoff, and, well, let's just say that I was inspired to do a little baking. So, I decided to make scones, which, for anyone who doesn't know, are a stalwart of English Cream Teas in their sweet form, and appear on lots of canapés' trays in their savoury form.

I went for a savoury scone, mixing a classic combination of strong English Cheddar cheese and rosemary, and I decided to make them bite-size, because I've never made scones before and I thought they'd be easier to manage. So, without further ado, here's the recipe with my tweaks.

My Scones :)

Ingredients

• 250g Self-raising white flour and a little extra for dusting
• 1 pinch of salt
• 1 pinch of cayenne pepper (I made this addition to the recipe based on the fact that the cayenne lifts the flavour of the cheese and complements the rosemary - vary the amount to your taste depending on how much spice you like)
• 1tbsp rosemary
• 150g strong white cheddar (grated)
• 200ml milk (more or less to make the dough soft)
• 1 egg, beaten

Method

• Pre-heat the oven to 220 degrees centigrade
• Sift the flour, salt, cayenne and rosemary into a bowl
• Mix in 100g of the grated cheese
• Pour in the milk a bit at a time, mixing until you have a soft dough (you may not need all the milk, or a little more)
• Turn out the dough onto a floured surface and roll out to about 1cm thick
• Using a 3.5 cm cutter, cut out the mini scones and place on parchment paper on baking sheets
• Brush each with the beaten egg on top (don't drip it down the sides of the scones, this will impede an even rise in the oven - that's straight out of Paul Hollywood's mouth from Bakeoff)
• Sprinkle over the remainder of the cheese
• Cook in the oven for 10 min until golden brown and risen.
• Leave to cool on a wire rack

So, I did leave these to cool on the rack, but none of my family could resist trying them warm from the oven and they were an irresistible bite, so much so that, since it was tea time, half the batch is now gone ;). They were also very tasty cold later as a supper bite.