Lemonade Scones are the fastest and easiest scones you will ever make! Incredibly fluffy, moist scones made from scratch using only 3 ingredients – self raising flour, cream and lemonade. The secret ingredient is lemonade – but they don’t taste of lemon at all!
This is the faster way to make classic scones which call for butter to be rubbed or blitzed into flour. Lemonade Scones rise ever so slightly less, but the difference is barely noticeable!
Lemonade Scones
Scones are as Australian as Meat Pies and Lamingtons. Made the traditional way, butter is rubbed into flour using your fingers – or a food processor. Not particularly difficult, but it does take time, calling for fridge cold butter to be diced into cubes.
I don’t know who discovered this genius shortcut way of making scones, but I am forever indebted to them. Sometimes I do enjoy taking the time to make scones the traditional way. But I usually make these Lemonade Scones which honestly come out so similar and yet take less than half the time to make.
If you’ve never tried these before, you’re honestly going to be amazed. Seriously AMAZED!
Scones are an afternoon tea favourite in Australia, brought to our shores when the British settled here just over 200 years ago. It’s a regular at quaint tea houses, especially in the countryside, and at local bake sales!
What’s the difference between an American biscuit and a scone?
🇺🇸That’s biscuits as they’re known in America that look like our scones! A southern classic served savoury, fabulous with grits, sausage gravy and eggs.
A comparison of the classic Aussie scone recipe with this New York Times Biscuits recipe is all it takes to verify that they are indeed made the same way – just used for different purposes. 🙂 Lemonade Scones are slightly more different because they are a touch sweeter than classic scones.
What you need for Lemonade Scones
Here are the 3 ingredients you need:
Self raising flour – this is just plain flour (all purpose flour) and baking powder that’s already been combined. It’s sold as “self raising flour” in the UK, Australia, NZ. It’s easy to make your own self raising flour simply by mixing 2 tsp baking powder for every 1 cup of flour.
Cream – thickened or heavy cream works best I find. But it does work fine with ordinary cream too, but it needs to be full fat (I found low fat didn’t work as well, not as soft inside); and
Lemonade -the “secret ingredient”, the namesake of this scone recipe!! I don’t know the science behind why it works. I like to think the fizz activates the baking powder to make the scones rise and make them fluffy, but I’m totally guessing here!
What type of Lemonade to use?
Schweppes and Kirks Lemonade are the two brands I use. I’ve made it with “no frills” too and it worked fine, so I am pretty sure any lemonade brand should be fine. Sprite and 7 Up also work – tried it and it comes out exactly the same!
How to make Lemonade Scones
Just dump the flour, cream and lemonade into a bowl, mix, turn out onto board, cut out scones and bake.
Yep. That’s it. Really!
Lemonade Scones – Tips!
Few tips to share to ensure your scones come out soft and fluffy every time!!
Less dough handling = fluffier scones. So only mix the batter until the flour is almost fully incorporated (ie can still some flour), then scrape onto work surface and knead as few times as possible to bring together into a disc shape with a pretty smooth surface (I aim for 5 kneads, 8 is ok).
Do not twist the cutter – press the cutter straight down and up, resist the urge to twist! If you twist, the sides of the scones gets “smeared” which affects how well they rise.
Avoid touching sides of scones – use a big kitchen knife or similar to transfer scones to tray to avoid touching the sides of the scones.
Place so they’re touching each other ever so slightly – because they help each other rise (isn’t that just so sweet? 😍)
Don’t be tight with the jam and cream – there’s nothing sadder than running out of cream mid scone scoffing!!
Whether Lemonade Scones or traditional made scones, they are best served warm but MUST be served with copious amounts of cream and jam. There’s just really no getting around that part. It’s like having a grilled cheese sandwich without cheese. It just ain’t right. Just saying.😇
– Nagi x
Watch how to make it
More Aussie favourites
Scones – made the classic way
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Lemonade Scones – 3 Ingredients From Scratch
Ingredients
- 3 1/2 cups self raising flour , plus extra for dusting (flour sub – Note 1)
- 1 cup thickened cream (heavy cream), not whipped!
- 1 cup lemonade (Note 2)
To serve
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 200°C/390°F (180°C fan). Line tray with baking/parchment paper.
- Combine the flour, cream and lemonade in a bowl and mix until flour is mostly combined. Do not over mix, it will make the scones dense! The dough should be soft and fairly sticky.
- Turn out onto a floured surface, and knead gently just 3 – 5 times to bring dough together, then gently pat into a disc shape 2.5cm/1" thick.
- Use a 6cm/2.5" round cutter to cut rounds – press straight up and down (don't twist), flour cutter in between. (Note 4)
- Use a knife or similar to scoop up (avoid touching sides) and place on tray, slightly touching each other (they help each other rise).
- Brush the tops lightly with milk. (Note 5)
- Bake for 15 minutes until golden on top. Place on rack to cool. Place tea towel over them to stop the tops from getting crusty.
- Serve with copious amounts of cream and jam, and of course tea!
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
Originally published January 2014. Long overdue to add a recipe video and fresh new photos!
Life of Dozer
Now you see it… now you don’t! (Except for the smear of cream on his snout 🐽)
An old favourite, yum! Will try this with zero sprite as I can’t have sugar any more dammit!
Absolutely delicious and simple to make. Husband and kids gobbled them up. No more store bought ones for this family now 😍 and tastes so much lighter. Thank you very much! Now I’m off to make another batch ☺️
Hi, looks like a great recipe. I’m about to make them and was wondering how the best way is to store them. considering they have cream in them. do they need to be in the refrigerator, or can they stay on the countertop? thanks
Excellent and simple!
Thank you
I will definitely try them soon!
Made these forty Mothers Day today – beautiful! Split the mix in half to make some as plain scones and the others half with a cup of sultanas added.
Just making a second batch. The first bake miraculously disappeared 😂.
Absolutely delicious. 🥰
The softest scones that can last more than one day! So easy. I just added a pinch of salt.
I noticed a discrepancy in the amount of baking powder to be added to make self rising flour than commonly used in the states. The recommendation here (for decades) has been 1 tsp per cup of flour (and 1/4 tsp salt). I happen to have brought home some packets of baking powder from a trip to Italy. It’s not the same ingredients as baking powder made in the states.
I used most of a 10g packet for this recipe, as it stated specifically how much flour it was for (500g).
The scones came out great! Probably I should have added a bit of salt.
I’d love to do a comparison of baking powder and self rising flour around the world. I suspect they would be awful with 2 tsp of American baking powder per cup of flour.
In Australia, we save self raising flour (which isn’t quite the same as American self rising (without the “a”
The Australian one contains no salt. I’m unsure if the other contents are exactly the same.
When I lived in Tokyo, I could only get the American one, and didn’t like it, so resorted to always bringing a bag or two of SR flour back when visiting Oz (along with tomato sauce and Vegemite)
Yes, I’m aware that you can “make” SR flour But prefer not to.
I think I’ll have to look at the packages of various brands here. I don’t buy self-raising/rising flour myself very often as most of my recipes don’t use it.
Do you happen to have some baking powder around? Can you tell me the ingredients. I’m quite interested in the fact that American and Italian are different.
Lemonade in the states is not carbonated.
It would be interesting to see if the extra lift is coming from the citric acid or the carbonation, I suspect the latter as baking powder already contains the acid it needs to rise. But the extra zing and sweetness come from the flavoring.
I’ve got some lemon-lime soda. I’m gonna give this a whirl.
Valerie, what we call Lemonade is not what you call lemonade. Do you have sprite? I think it’s what you would call a soda with a lemon lime flavouring.
Ok so I just made these to go with my homemade clotted cream! I made Nagi other recipe for scones which required butter mixed in via a food processor a few days ago. While those did not rise as well as these..I have to say,, for me, the ones with the butter had a tad more flavour. ( very subtle). These 3 ingredient ones were nice a soft and rose beautifully, just not sure I’d call them scones but rather a biscuit? But what does this South Asian born Canadian know about those kind of things! lol.
Such a quick and easy recipe that results in light and fluffy scones.
I did half quantity which made 7 scones.
This is the same recipe as my Grandmothers and it is amazingly simple. One of the first things I ever learnt to cook as a child. I can also confirm this works perfectly with sugar free lemonade if you want a sugar free scone. It doesn’t effect the flavour at all.
Personally use soda water if you want these to not taste sweet
Tastes delicious, my whole family lived them. Easy to follow recipe. Couldn’t be happier!!! Nagi- u r the bees knees
Just made the lemonade scones, I mixed with a knife, (mum taught me) they came out great, so quick and easy cleanup , thanks Again Nagi.
Nagi, I realise this makes no sense, but looking at the recipes for US biscuits, I see they sound like they should be the same, but they aren’t. I lived in Georgia, USA for 8 years. And until you have fried chicken on a biscuit and know it’s a match made in heaven – you can’t call Australian scones the same thing. Chick-Fil-A for the breakfast biscuit win. If I could return – this would be my first stop. https://www.chick-fil-a.com/menu/chick-fil-a-chicken-biscuit
Chick-fil-a biscuits aren’t traditional biscuits, they are somewhere between a biscuit and bread. They contain yeast.
The Chick-Fil-A biscuits look like what my mom used to make in Canada called baking powder biscuits. They contain flour, baking powder, butter, a bit of sugar and salt and milk or buttermilk. Their texture is kind of different to a scone and top is nubbly not smooth. Both scones and biscuits are absolutely delicious either with sweet or savoury toppings. We’d have butter and cheese on the biscuits followed by one with butter and jam, no cream. So good I feel like making some now.
Hi just wondering if I could add dates to this recipe
YES!!!! Yum….I love date scones….do it!
Amazing!! So quick and easy! I didn’t knead! I added dates! So good! Will make often! Thank you Nagi! 😊
Such an easy recipe! The scones turned out perfectly fluffy and light. I made about 16 and had to freeze some. What’s the best way to reheat frozen scones?
This recipe looks so easy i have no reason not to make this for my partner as she loves scones. Can I substitute the lemonade with zero sugar lemonade or soda water to make it not as sweet? will it change the texture or anything about the scones?
Made this dairy free using plant based cream and it still worked a treat! Delicious and so fun for the kids to make