Scone

How do you pronounce Scone?

Is it sk-own, or scon?

Each is used in the UK

How do you serve it?

With Jam

With Cream

With Butter?

Or all three?

Etiquette matters!

Cream first

Jam first?

You can tell if someone

is from Cornwall or Devon.

I can never remember

which way they choose?

Just they do opposites

My way is butter, then jam

and cream on top. Yum

And with hot chocolate.

Although it should be tea to drink…

Dilemma time!

Did you know?

Credit Moorlands eater photo of a Staffordshire Oatcake.

Today is Staffordshire Oatcake day. According to Google:

“Oatcake Day is celebrated annually on August 8th to honor Staffordshire and its famous oatcake. The day began in 2010. Some people celebrate by visiting Staffordshire Oatcakes in Hanley to learn how the Potteries staple is made. Others share their oatcake creations on social media using the hashtag #StaffordshireDay.”

Basically the Staffordshire Oatcake is a thin pancake style flat tasty disk made of oatmeal flour, yeast, water and possibly other ingredients. It is cooked on a hot griddle in a thin layer so it ends up looking a bit like a lace doily but with fewer holes. You can buy a dozen or half a dozen to take home, or if you get them from an oatcake shop you can have them with various toppings. Mostly cheese and bacon, or bacon and mushroom. My favourite is sausage, cheese and tinned tomatoes. Sometimes with a bit of brown sauce. You can also eat them hot with butter and jam, but that’s probably not acceptable behaviour! And rolled or folded? That’s your choice!

Definitely a Staffordshire specialty. Not to be confused with Scottish oatcakes which are smaller and thicker.

Local artist, poet and author, Arthur Berry wrote “Ode to the Oatcake”…

Crumpets for tea

Hot buttered crumpets for tea! The little holes in the top of them allow the butter or margarine to trickle down into tiny tubes inside the crumpet. You heat them under a grill or in a toaster on both sides to heat them up. The base of them is solid so when you add your topping it doesn’t leak out. I only used to have butter, but recently I’ve added grated cheese and microwaved them for a few seconds so it drizzled inside them, also try honey or jam (America calls it jelly). Note these are NOT muffins, that’s a whole different bready food.

Scones

Our tea at Westport lake cafe was coffee and scones with jam and clotted cream.

I put jam on first, then cream on top. Some people do it the other way round (cream first) how?

Scones are pronounced scownes rhymes with owns or scons, rhymes with ones. It depends what part of the country you live in… For a small country we have a lot of differences in accents!

I have a sarcasm gene

My hubby went shopping today.

I asked him to get savoury food.

So he got:

4 tins of tomatoes, a litre of skimmed milk, some mushrooms, brown bread.

Then, a large Christmas cake, Christmas pudding, mint chocolate matchsticks, grapes, iced buns, a chocolate toffee apple, clementines, bananas, two pomegranates, dried cranberries, two jars of honey, a pot of jam. He also got himself four bottles of beer and four cans of sweat cider.

I’m diabetic, so I can’t eat any of these and can’t really drink much alcohol. My sarcasm gene kicked in so I told him he was being ‘sweet’, I said he should get me some honey roasted ham or some duck in orange sauce. After I washed the shopping and put it away I asked him how much he had spent. I guess 90% of what he bought is for him.

Slightly annoyed!

Down the Rabbit Hole (Tearoom).

Afternoon tea in a place called the Rabbit Hole tearoom in Stoke, Stoke-on-Trent. We had a visitor down from Yorkshire and he wanted to go somewhere that sold loose leaf tea and cakes. After searching Google and ringing a few places we found this cafe virtually on our doorstep. I rang and got us in (they are pretty much fully booked till March!).

The decor was fun, with lots of Alice in wonderland and white rabbit touches. There were pictures on the ceiling and it was very ‘jolly’!

Very pleasant food, with friendly service. We had sandwiches, salad, crisps, followed by scones with jam and cream. There was cake and cupcakes but that was too much for me!