Fancy baking scones like a pro? Great British Bake Off judge Paul Hollywood has got you covered with his top tips for the perfect bake.
The Merseyside-born baking legend, who began his career in his father’s bakery and shot to fame on GBBO, is now dishing out his expert advice to budding bakers through his TikTok and YouTube channels.
Paul recently revealed on TikTok his foolproof method for achieving the ultimate scone.
Paul’s essential advice includes avoiding lumps in your dough, being careful with egg wash application, and sticking to a strict 15-minute baking rule.
He warns against lumpy mixtures: “Lumps are bad in a scone because you don’t want a big lump of butter in there, you will end up with butter just pouring all over your tray, which is what you don’t want.”
He also highlights a common egg washing error, he said: “Now, egg wash the top, try not to egg wash the sides, if it goes down the sides too much it creates a glue and prevents it from rising up.”
And when it comes to baking time, Paul insists: “Use the 15-minute scone in an oven as a good rule. And 15 minutes bang on is 99% of the time going to be spot on.”
Follow these simple steps, and you could be the star baker in your own kitchen, reports the Liverpool Echo.
For his scone recipe, Paul uses 500g of strong white flour, 50g of unsalted butter, 80g of caster sugar, 5tsp of baking powder, two medium eggs and 250ml of whole milk.
He likes to have all his ingredients ready and an oven preheated to 220°C or gas mark 7.
He then combines the flour and butter, rubbing them together until they resemble breadcrumbs. Next, he adds the sugar and baking powder and mixes them in.
He then adds the two eggs and lightly stirs before adding the milk until it forms a soft dough. On a floured surface, he folds the dough together.
Paul then flattens out his dough and dusts his dough cutter in flour before cutting out the scones. He then applies an egg wash and follows the 15-minute rule for cooking.
This should yield 12 perfect scones. For Paul’s complete recipe and step-by-step video, visit his YouTube tutorial.
