Recipe for amazing perfect sourdough scones with sultanas and cranberries. Tasty, fluffy and bloomin lovely with a thick smear of salty butter and a good old English brew!
I've been lovingly caring for the sourdough starter I made a month or so ago. I mastered the art of general bread making - with a little help from Mr Hollywood - about a year ago (it was a happy day for me when my dough addicted husband declared my bread delicious. I'd had far too many 'hmmm it's okaaaay' comments!).
So I thought I'd up my game and try some artisan bread.
After baking a delicious looking loaf (that took around 19 hours from start to finish), I had to shamefacedly admit that I don't like sourdough bread (blush).
How disappointing! I'd had it a few times when we were on holiday in California, and I don't think I really liked it then, but I wanted to think I was a bit of a foodie, and therefore it was the law that I liked sourdough bread. Oh well.  As with olives, I'll keep trying in the vain hope that I can eventually look sophisticated like the rest of you sourdough/olive eating folk.
After a second failed attempt with Mr Hollywood's almond and honey sourdough, I admitted defeat with the breads and decided to give my starter one last chance in a cake (can you call a scone a cake?) before bringing an end to it's wasted life.
And guess what? Success! Tasty, fluffy and bloomin lovely sourdough scopes with a thick smear of salty butter and a good old English brew!
The Sourdough Scones Recipe:
Sourdough Scones
Ingredients
- 400 g (3 ¼ cups + 1 tbsp) self raising flour
- 100 g (6 ½ tbsp) cold butter - cut into small cubes
- ¼ tsp salt
- 100 g (½ cup) golden caster sugar
- 75 g (⅜ cup) sultanas
- 50 g (¼ cup) dried cranberries - you can swap the sultanas and cranberries for other dried fruit like raisins/cherries etc if you like
- 250 g (1 cup) sourdough starter
- 70 ml (4 ½ tbsp) whole milk, warm, but not hot - semi skimmed will do if you haven't got whole
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
For brushing:
- 2 tbsp milk
INSTRUCTIONS
- Preheat the oven to 200C/400F (fan) and line a baking tray with baking parchment.400 g (3 ¼ cups + 1 tbsp) self raising flour, 100 g (6 ½ tbsp) cold butter, ¼ tsp salt, 100 g (½ cup) golden caster sugar, 75 g (⅜ cup) sultanas, 50 g (¼ cup) dried cranberries
- Place the flour, salt and butter in a large bowl and rub together with your fingertips until most of the butter lumps have gone. Add the sugar and dried fruit and give it a quick mix.
- In a separate bowl, mix the starter, milk and vanilla extract.250 g (1 cup) sourdough starter, 70 ml (4 ½ tbsp) whole milk, warm, but not hot, 2 tsp vanilla extract
- Pour ¾ of the starter mixture into the flour mixture and use a round ended knife to work the mixture together. Add more of the starter mixture and work in gently until you have a soft, slightly sticky dough. Don't overwork, or you'll get tough scones.
- Tip out the dough onto a floured surface and flatten it out with your hands so that it's about 3cm thick. Use a round cutter dipped in flour (to prevent it sticking) and cut out your scones. Make sure you just press the cutter down rather than twist it - otherwise you'll get scones that rise a bit wonky.
- Gather the leftover dough, gently rework and cut out the rest of the scones until all the dough is used.
- Place on the prepared baking tray, brush with a little milk and place in the oven for 12-15 minutes until golden brown.2 tbsp milk
- Remove from the oven, leave to cool and serve sliced in half with butter.
✎ Notes
Nutrition
Nikki says
I added cinnamon and chopped apple. Very easy to make.
Could you leave them to rise a little before baking? What would happen?
Jackie says
Tried this today and the scones came out lovely. Thanks so much for sharing this recipe.
Peroline says
Really good scones nice and light and fluffy. My son in law thought that they came from a shop!
Graham says
You say you don’t like sourdough bread. I’m guessing because it’s too strong, usually because people use very little leaven. Try again using 3/10 leaven, 4/10 flour, 3/10 water and 1% salt. Think you’ll find you love it.
Give it a go.
Jessica says
I make them with oat milk and have made them over and over and over! Love
Kelly says
So good I am about to make them again!
Lara says
Is this with fed or discard starter? I was just about to make it and realized it's not clear
Trudy Normanton says
Brilliant recipe, say to follow and the scones were brilliant. Thank you x
Joao Grilo says
Lovely scones, with the added bonus of fermentation.
Fiona says
So quick and easy! Tastes great. Only change I made was adding tsp of lemon juice in place of tsp milk
Dadyma says
Just baked them they were almost perfect. As oven temperatures can vary slightly, I feel I needed to leave them in a couple of minutes longer some of them were slightly dense inside.
Delicious otherwise. Will certainly be trying again. Thanks for sharing the recipe
Beth Melidonis says
This is my second time making this recipe and there wouldn’t be a second time if I didn’t love it. The dough was always a little wet in the end but I have fixed it with a couple tablespoons powered milk. All is good now and I use dates and apricots. 😋
Pat Render says
Made these today. Took a bit longer to brown in conventional fan oven at 180 but browned much quicker in steam oven on circotherm setting. Only taste tested the conventional oven one so far. Delicious and a great way to use up sour dough discard. The steam oven ones felt lighter so will go that way next time probably. Thanks.
Frankie Blake says
Found I needed to add at least another 85gms sourdough starter as was far too dry. Should your recipe say 170ml/gm rather than 70?
Having said that, with the extra liquid everyone says they are the best ever.
Nicky Corbishley says
Hi Frankie, the recipes uses 250g of sourdough starter. The 70g was for the milk. Glad you enjoyed them 🙂