Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Tattie scones recipe to mark The Bard's 253rd birth anniversary

Tattie scones / Potato scones / Kartulikakud

Scots across the world (both true and honorary, like me) are celebrating Rabbie Burns' aka The Bards 253rd birth anniversary today. I've already ordered a sheep's pluck and will be making my own haggis over the weekend (yay! for the first time!), but today I made something less exotic - tattie scones. Tattie scones or potato pancakes are the Scottish equivalent of Jewish latkes and Norwegian lefses, and one of my fondest breakfast memories from Scotland (those of you who are new to Nami-Nami and are wondering about the Scottish connection:  I spent seven years studying and working in the beautiful capital of Scotland, Edinburgh, returning to my dear homeland in October 2006. That definitely makes me an honorary Scotswoman, I think :)).

Tattie scones are brilliantly easy to make. You can use freshly boiled potatoes,  leftover potato mash or even cold cooked potatoes. I've tried them all; the ones I made earlier today were from cold boiled potatoes ('tatties' in Scottish).

Tattie Scones
(Šoti kartulipannkoogid)
Serves two to four

250 g (cooked) potatoes
25 g (about 2 Tbsp) butter
60 g (100 ml or 7 level Tbsp) all-purpose flour
0.5 tsp fine salt
0.25 tsp baking powder

oil or butter for frying

If you're using uncooked potatoes, then peel and cut into chunks, then boil in lightly salted water until done. Drain thoroughly, then mash and mix with rest of the ingredients.
If you're using cooked cold potatoes, then grate them finely, knead in the softened butter and then add the dry ingredients and mix until combined. The dough should be soft and pliable.
Divide into two and form each into a round disk. Working with one dough disc at the time, roll it on a lightly floured surface into a flat pancake, about 5-7 mm thick. Cut into sectors (I usually cut into four large sectors or 6 to 8 smaller ones).
Heat a heavy frying pan to medium-hot, add some oil or butter. Transfer the tattie scones onto the frying pan and gently fry on both sides, until golden brown spots form (that'll take about 3 minutes on both sides, depending on your frying pan and on the thickness of the scones).
Transfer onto a wire rack to cool. Serve with some butter (traditional) or some herb cream cheese (on the photo).

Other favourite Scottish recipes @ Nami-Nami:
Cook-a-leekie soup
Cranachan (a raspberry and whipped cream dessert)
Mince and tatties
Oatcakes

Other foodbloggers writing about tattie scones:
Wendy @ A Wee Bit of Cooking (lovely heart-shaped ones ;))
Emma @ The Laughing Gastronome
Susan @ The Well-Seasoned Cook (LOVE the sprinkling of caraway seeds!)
Valli @ More Than Burnt Toast

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Tasty! Thanks for the recipe, too - had always vaguely wondered how to make them, and now I know. :)

Emma said...

Aww, that's nice! Your tattie scones look amazing although we are greedy and prefer ours thicker. For M and I they are an essential component (along with a fried egg) to any camping trip up north. We will think of you over our haggis tonight (veggie for me of course).

Tanita said...

Oh, yum.
This is one of the foods from Scotland that will be a KEEPER when we leave.

Michael said...

Dr P, you are BOTH a 'true' AND and an ' honorary' Scot. (and we'll wangle you, K and the kids dual citizenship after the referendum is out the way!). Home made haggis? Yummmmmmm!!!

Susan said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Susan said...

Thanks for the shout-out, Pille! I love all the comforting, filling breadstuffs which hail from the U.K. Wouldn't mind a plate of these right now with good black tea. : )

Good luck with your haggis!

Heidi Park said...

looks really good!

Catherine said...

Hi,

I'm Kat from the Philippines. i just tried your tattie scone recipe hours earlier (a dinner starter) and it was delicious. I hope you don't mind that I used yellow sweet potato instead (that's the only one available, I was craving and picked the nearest cooked potato I could find).

Much love,
-CL

Pille said...

Catherine, that's so sweet - thank you for letting me know :) I had some leftover mashed potato from Saturday, and made tattie scones for lunch on Sunday :)