RECIPE: Cheese and Guinness Scones

I know, I know, it's absolutely AGES since I posted a recipe. It's not that I'm cooking any less, far from it, but that most of it is from other people's recipes or ones of mine that I've already shared.

Anyway, over the weekend I've been doing some pre-Christmas cooking - the cake, the mincemeat and the pudding.  Like many people, I like to put some Guinness in my Christmas pudding. But it only uses about a quarter of a bottle, and neither of us likes drinking Guinness. I usually use up the leftovers in a beef casserole, but I fancied trying something different with it this time. A friend on social media pointed me to this recipe  which looked great but is written very much for an American audience, so I have "translated" it for British readers and adapted it slightly to suit my tastes and what was available in my kitchen.

Ingredients:

280g plain flour
1 level tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
½ teaspoon salt
85g cold butter, diced
100g finely grated Cheddar cheese
left over Guinness - about 250ml (tip: it is easier to pour and measure if it is slightly flat, so leftover Guinness is a lot easier to handle than freshly opened stuff)

Pre-heat the oven to 220 C (200 fan), gas mark 7, 425 F

Line a baking sheet with non-stick paper

Sift together the flour, baking powder, bicarb soda and salt. Stir in the cheese then rub in the butter. Gradually blend in enough Guinness to make a very soft dough, just firm enough to handle.

Pat out on a floured surface to about 1.5cm thick and use a plain scone cutter to cut into circles.  I found it made 10 scones.

Place on the baking sheet and bake for 14 minutes until risen and lightly browned. Eat warm or cold, halved and spread with butter.

We found them absolutely delicious. They didn't taste "Guinnessy" at all - more Marmitey than anything, and although they are already packed with cheese they go beautifully with MORE cheese! The Guinness in them makes them incredibly light.

Scones tend to go stale very quickly so make sure you freeze any that you don't eat within 24 hours, or eat stale ones toasted. I rather fancy a toasted one with black cherry jam, or perhaps topped with cream cheese and some sweet chilli jam.