This week’s Home Tones colour is buttermilk. We’re surprised it’s taken us such a long time to feature it as virtually our entire house is painted this colour. It’s such a lovely, warm shade which we find works well with an eclectic interior décor scheme – it’s better than stark white for this old stone house. Our vintage, mid century modern, antique and industrial pieces all sit well against it. It’s also the perfect backdrop for colourful paintings and art prints. Wood, wicker and seagrass add texture without jarring. We’ve got an orange feature wall in the kitchen – and are considering some dramatic dark grey in certain areas too, but buttermilk has featured in all of our houses over the years and will likely continue to do so.
Tag: buttermilk
Cakes & Bakes: Buttermilk scones
These buttermilk scones are probably the quickest, easiest and perhaps cheapest recipe we’ve featured in our Cakes & Bakes series. There are only 2 ingredients; self-raising flour and buttermilk… Three, if you count the pinch of salt. And they take less than half an hour to make; from getting the ingredients out of the cupboard, to taking the scones out of the oven.
It’s a great beginner’s recipe or something to make with the kids. All you need is equal weights of flour and milk – simple to remember! If the dough feels a little sticky (some buttermilk can be thicker or thinner in consistency than others) add a little more flour. Similarly, if the dough feels too hard, add a little more buttermilk (or milk if you’ve already used all the buttermilk).
Buttermilk scones make a great afternoon snack that can be put together in almost the same time as it might take to make a sandwich. Have them savoury with thin slices of sharp cheddar cheese, or go sweet with a fruit jam and clotted cream.
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Buttermilk scones
Ingredients
- 250 g self-raising flour
- 250 g buttermilk
- pinch of salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 225ºC/440ºF/gas mark 7
- Line a large oven tray with parchment paper and set aside
- Mix the flour and salt in a mixing bowl
- Reserve about 2tbs of the buttermilk before adding the rest to the flour
- Bring together to form quite a wet dough, trying not to mix or knead too much
- Flour a work surface well before gently rolling the dough to about 2cm thick
- Form rounds using a medium-sized cookie/pastry cutter
- Place the rounds on the baking tray leaving a little space between
- Brush the top of each with the reserved buttermilk
- Bake for 12-15 minutes or until the tops have turned a light golden brown
- Allow to cool for a few minutes on a wire rack
- Serve while still warm
Cakes & Bakes: Banana blueberry cranberry buttermilk cake
We always have a stash of berries in the freezer. It’s usually a lot cheaper than fresh – and often more nutritious, not deteriorating on the supermarket shelves over time. And it means you can get hold of them all year round. It’s usually blueberries from Morrisons, only £2 for a 350 gram container. Sometimes it’s strawberries from Lidl.
I bought a container of fresh cranberries at Christmas when they were on offer, and put them straight into the freezer with the intention of doing something with them at a later date. The first thing I did was to use some of them in a smoothie. I thought the smoothie was quite tasty but after the first sip, Justin pulled a face like he’d just sucked on a lemon!
My second cranberry endeavour has been much more successful. I made a banana blueberry cranberry buttermilk cake. ‘Tasty. More an afternoon cake with a cup of tea, than a dessert cake.’, was the verdict. I think that meant he approved!
Banana, blueberry & cranberry buttermilk cake
Ingredients
- 115 g butter softened
- 250 g caster sugar
- 2 eggs
- 60 ml buttermilk
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- 300 g plain flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- ¼tsp bicarbonate of soda
- pinch tsp salt
- 3 bananas
- 100 g blueberries
- 50 g cranberries I used frozen blueberries & cranberries, but you can use fresh if it's in season
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF/Gas mark 4
- In a food processor, using the K-beater attachment, cream the butter & caster sugar until fluffy
- In a small measuring jug, lightly beat the eggs, before adding them to the butter & sugar, a little at a time, mixing after each addition
- Mix in the buttermilk and vanilla extract
- In another medium-sized mixing bowl, sift all the dry ingredients together - flour, baking powder, bicarb & salt
- Add the dry to the wet mixture in 3 stages, mixing after each addition
- Roughly slice the bananas and mix into the batter
- With a spatula, fold in the blueberries and cranberries
- Pour the batter into a greased 23cm/9inch loose-based deep sandwich cake tin and make level with the spatula
- Bake for 35-40 minutes or until an inserted skewer comes away clean
- Leave in the tin for 5 minutes before running a sharp knife around the inside circumference of the tin and easing it away
- Allow to cool on a wire rack
