The bad news is, the day before Valentine’s day was Friday the Thirteenth, and unfortunately a strange fellow in a stripey jumper (sweater) with knives for fingernails stole all our scones. Actually that’s a lie, what really happened was the pink-icing butter biscuits (cookies) above took so long to make, we ran out of time to do scones as well this week. So scones will be back next week.

But the good news is that pink-icing butter biscuits will be making a special one-day-only romantic appearance later this morning (it’s 12.19am as I write this). If you are reading this any time after 1pm on the 14th February 2009, you missed them, which is very sad, but they are not too hard to make despite taking a while, and the recipe is right here.

We hope you have a great Valentine’s day, and remember to treat your sweetie to a delicious Cornish pasty or a lovely bag of flapjack, or if you don’t have a sweetie then be your own sweetie and get them for yourself. Although it’s never too late- come back next week and there will be scones again! Proof that every cloud has a silver lining and the key is just remembering to live life as inside-out as possible.

New honey and raisin scones, as seen at Sunset Valley Farmers’ Market

According to Wikipedia, scones are “drier and larger” in the United States than in the UK where they originally come from- Scottish first, then popularised by the English 4pm tea tradition. The best way to eat them now is as part of a “cream tea” in Devon or Cornwall (SW England), split in half down the middle and piled with strawberry jam and clotted cream. If you can’t get clotted cream, which is a very thick spoonable cream with a sort of crust on top (sounds weird, tastes great) then whipped cream is pretty good too.

I like scones split and spread with butter as a slightly healthier option, using English butter which is way better than the pale American sort. Although, the scones above are still good without butter or cream or jam, just as they are, which is apparently the American Way.

Shakespeare fans may also know that Scone is the ancient coronation site in Scotland, where Macbeth gets crowned king after murdering most of the rest of the cast. Sadly Shakespeare did not mention whether the coronation tea party involved butter, jam or cream, but they would all have gone well with traditional Shakespearean mead, which is made with fermented honey- Renaissance Fayre planners, take note!