I dreamt this up after I saw lots of news items referring to national cream tea day. I laughed when I saw that – no, not because it’s bizarre to have a day dedicated to scones, cream and jam but because why on earth would the British need a day for it?
It’s practically a national pastime.
Notes
Take your time over piping the meringues and they can be pretty close together as they will hardly spread at all.
Equipment
- A couple of baking trays, lined – you’ll need them both for the meringues and the scones
- Bowls
- Piping bag and medium round nozzle (about 3mm)
- Electric whisk or stand mixer
- Round cutter
- Pastry brush
Ingredients – meringue
- Egg whites, 3 (from medium-sized eggs)
- Caster sugar – 175g
- Vanilla bean paste – 1/2 teaspoon (or seeds from half a vanilla pod)
Ingredients – scones
- Plain flour – 300g
- Unsalted butter – 80g
- Baking powder – 2 teaspoons
- Salt – a pinch
- Caster sugar – 50g
- Egg, 1 medium-sized
- Vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract – 1/2 teaspoon
- Double (thick) cream – 110ml
- Plus, a little milk and caster sugar for brushing and dusting
Ingredients – additional
- A good soft strawberry jam
- Cornish clotted cream, or failing that a whipped double cream
Method – meringues
- See my tips on making meringues to ensure you’ve got the best possible chance of getting right every time
- Put the oven on to 100C
- Have the two baking trays prepared and ready
- Whisk the egg whites until stiff
- While still whisking, gradually and slowly pour all the cast sugar in and ensure the whites are mixed to stiff peaks
- Add in the vanilla and whisk just enough to spread it evenly throughout the egg whites
- Prepare the piping bag with medium round nozzle and spoon in as much of the meringue as you can fit
- Pipe small drops of meringue (about 1cm / half an inch base) and draw the bag up and away as you stop piping to create a little droplet shape
- Continue to pipe meringue ‘dots’ until you run out of meringue – this amount will fill up two baking trays and make about 80 teensy-tiny meringue drops
- Pop in the oven and bake for 50 minutes
- Leave to cool on the trays
Method – scones
- Set the oven to 200C
- Prepare a baking tray with paper or silicon sheet
- Rub in the butter, flour and sugar until it’s crumbly and combined (ie no butter lumps)
- Mix in everything else and bring together
- Don’t overwork – ie it doesn’t need kneading
- Roll out to about 4cm thick and press out the rounds with the cutter
- You should get 7 – 8 scones, depending on the size of the cutter you are using
- Don’t twist the cutter – plunge it straight in and lift straight off. Twisting will cause the scones to rise unevenly
- Lift the scones on to the baking sheet and space evenly apart
- Brush the tops with a little milk and then sprinkle a little caster sugar over the tops of each of them
- Pop in the oven for 15 minutes
- Leave to cool
Construction
- Cut the scones in half (a serrated bread knife is easiest)
- On each half pile the strawberry jam and a dollop of cream (if you’re Cornish this means jam first then cream, if you’re Devonian this means cream first and then jam. Did I say we were obsessed as a nation?!)
- Take five of the mini meringues per scone half and arrange on top
- Enjoy
Ink Sugar Spice ~ Lynn Clark 
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