Food Matters
JULIE PEGG
CREAM TEA, ANYONE?
Julie Pegg investigates the art of the scone in a Bloomsburg tea shop in London and at home in Vancouver in her own kitchen. In recent years my London visits have dwindled to brief stop-offs between wine trips to the continent, or excursions to the pretty English coast and countryside. This year I decided to make London a trip in and of itself. Rather than tearing through the various markets, cafés, pubs and gin houses, I shopped and sipped like a local, strolling Soho’s Berwick Market, shopping Brixton’s colourful stalls and Southwark’s busy Borough Market, picking up local cheeses, pickles, bagels and breads, spices, vegetables and herbs, after which I kicked back with an ale or an icy G & T. A Sunday morning stroll through the Columbia Road Flower Market in east London rewarded me with just-blooming daffodils for my rented flat. In Portobello Road Market, I scored antique doorknobs, which weighed a ton. (I would worry much later about how to get them home.) One blustery afternoon following a matinee of All About Eve at the Noël Coward Theatre, I thought I’d like to do “tea.” Were the dollar/pound ratio in kinder proportion, or had I someone with whom to chew over Gillian Anderson’s riveting performance as Margo Channing, an elaborate, spendy, late-afternoon array of sweet treats following savoury might have been the ticket. We could have chatted over wee scones, lemon tarts, Victoria sponge and Battenburg cakes preceded by anchovy, chive and nasturtium flower on pumpernickel rye. (Or perhaps Mrs. Beeton’s cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches— although according to my Mrs. Beeton’s Cookery Book, that doyenne of British cooking made sandwiches not with cream cheese but butter beaten with a “gill” of cream and seasoned with salt, mustard and cayenne pepper.) But I was flying solo with Joanna Trollope’s novel Second Honeymoon as my sole companion. Since I am very fond of scones, it was a simple cream tea I was after. A short stroll through a pretty green not far from the British Museum led me to Bea’s of Bloomsbury, which resembles a café more than a tea room. Tables are set simply. Teapots, cups and plates are gleaming white crockery, not fancy fine china, and the cakes at the display counter could
of lard along with butter and does not use eggs. Clotted cream is nearly impossible to find or astonishingly pricey, so I give it a whirl too. It’s a success. All that’s required is a glass baking dish, top quality full fat cream, eight to 12 hours in a steady 180°F oven and another few hours in the fridge covered with cling film to set.
hardly be referred to as dainty. The scones, too, are large, not the mini morsels on an after-
As to whether correct pronunciation is “skoan” or “skon,” or what to put on the scone first—
noon tea tray. Rounded like a bun, they complete all scone requirements—buttery, flaky and
cream or jam—who would have thought such an innocent blend of flour, butter and milk
feathery light. One plain and one dotted with sultanas arrived lovely and warm with a small
would stir up such debate? Without a second’s hesitation, my server at Bea’s grins and says,
pot of clotted cream and another of thick jam dotted with chunks of strawberry alongside. I
“‘Skon,’ and the cream first, definitely. You can tell anyone Sophie from Devon says so, and
pinched off a bit of scone, as one does, no knife please, and spread a dollop of cream then jam
we know all about scones and clotted cream.” Well, who am I to argue?
on the piece. One nibble and the whole lot melted into a sweet, creamy, crumbly richness, perfectly offset by a pot of piping hot, steeped English breakfast tea. I think immediately that this is how, on my return to Vancouver, I will pass a late spring afternoon out of doors.
A word about high tea. Even fine dining establishments misconstrue the term. Despite the lofty sounding title, it is an informal spread that may include Scotch eggs, Cornish pasties, cold beef, toad in the hole (Yorkshire pudding stuffed with sausages) and other hearty
I’m no baker and it takes two or three tries back home before I get the hang of making a
British fare, as well as cakes and tarts. This equally delightful “tea,” taken about six in the
feathery flaky scone. The secret is to know when to leave the dough well enough alone. My
evening, evolved as the evening meal among the working classes, who needed more than
best success so far is a recipe from The Guardian’s Felicity Cloak, who incorporates a bit
finger sandwiches, dainty pastries and tiny tartlets after a day’s toil.
12 MAY/JUNE 2019