My daughter has an international day at school tomorrow, and no surprises we are hosting the English table (thanks woodsey for the previous thread, got some good ideas!!) I decided to do afternoon tea with a china tea service, milk jug, sugar bowl etc etc, and scones with jam and cream...... my scones have turned out as flat as a pancake not sure if it is the flour I used (multi purpose) if anyone has made them with success over here could you please give me some pointers?!!!!! Any ideas will be gratefully received

Go to the Be-ro flour web site .they give a lot of hints about baking scones

any chance of just buying them?

Not much help to you, but a couple of out local bakeries make them fresh, so they are around...

what about making something like chelsea buns?

I'm still in the UK and my scones are always flat. My friend is a caterer and these are her tips.....start with a very hot oven and cut them quite thick so they don't have that far to rise and don't handle them too much, roll them out very lightly.
Could you make a victoria sponge and cucumber sandwiches instead ?

If you lived here, I direct you to this place http://www.carefreetea.com/index.php Clotted cream, Jam, scones and tea. Very pricey and la de da, but great place to take your American family. My mother in law loves the place.

Publix bakery sells homemade biscuits- very much like scones when split with jam and cream.
In the frozen foods section- Pilsbury oven baked biscuits (Southern style) come ready cut- just pop in the oven as per instructions and they make pretty good scones...they are already split too

Thanks to everyone for the advice!! Had success (somewhat!!) after I found some self-raising flour at Safeway, not great but i'm sure the kids won't know the difference Now just have to convince them with the hot tea.......

How about a burning hot vindaloo or phal curry instead. 5 - 10 year olds love those

That sounds like a really cute idea! I hope your daughter and her friends have fun!!

speaking of, MIL does indian foods for her school day, don't know why, she's an art teacher, but they always ask her to...naan bread always seems to go down a treat

But can't go wrong with tuna and cucumber sarnies

Glad you had some success! I always use the multipurpose flour and then add a generous couple of teaspoons of baking powder. Seems to do the trick.

You need to use Self-Rising flour, and if you go to Delia Smith's website (www.deliaonline.com) she has some wonderful recipes, including a great scone recipe....she even has a recipe for home-made pork pies The trick with scones is to keep the pastry thick when you roll it out - because even with Self-Rising flour they won't rise much. Be prepared to only get about 6 to 8 scones out of each batch.

You can make your own clotted cream at home - but it's a bit time-consuming and fiddly - I just whip up some heavy whipping cream instead, and the kids won't be bothered if it's real clotted cream anyway.

Don't forget the cucumber and the egg & cress sandwiches!

Best wishes, Paint.

you can find cress in this country?

Hard to find - but very easy to grow on a pad of damp kitchen roll LOL! Seeds are easy to fit in an envelope and send via air mail if you can't find them here.

Paint.