Name: Irish Bacon & Cheese Soda Bread Scones
Prep time: 25 min
Cook time: 15 min
Total time: 40 min
Cuisine: Irish
Ingredients: 150g bacon, diced; 2+3/4 c self raising flour; 1 tsp baking soda; 1 tsp baking powder; 2 tbsp sugar; 1 tsp sea salt flakes; 70g unsalted butter; 100g grated mature cheddar cheese; 270ml buttermilk + 1 extra tbsp to brush to tops of each scone with; 1 tbsp runny honey

Jump to Recipe

These easy Irish soda bread scones are the lovechild of traditional Irish soda bread and buttermilk scones. Think individual soda breads in the form of a scone but with a bacon and cheese twist! Serve them alongside a hearty soup for an easy supper.

A metal tray of cheese and bacon scones. A small bunch a dried flowers sit beside.

What you need to get started

Self-raising flour
Baking Soda & Baking Powder – Always make sure your baking powder is well in date before starting to bake. I tend to restock my baking powder every 3-4 months to ensure it’s always at its freshest. To keep track of it, just write the date you opened it on the base with a Sharpie or permanent marker – You’ll never be caught with out-of-date baking powder again!
White Sugar or golden castor sugar is always my go-to’s. Either will work perfectly.
Sea Salt flakes.
Unsalted butter – Straight from the fridge cold butter is an essential. Bonus points if it’s Irish butter. Kerry Gold unsalted butter makes perfect Irish scones and it’s always my go-to when I can get my hands on it. Be sure to chop your butter up into small cubes. Smaller pieces of butter make incorporating it into the flour easier.
Buttermilk. Out of buttermilk? Whip up a quick batch in just a few minutes by combining 1 cup of whole cream, and regular milk with the juice of ½ lemon. Stir with a fork and leave for a few minutes to curdle. And now you have buttermilk!
Runny Honey. If I don’t have honey in my cupboard, I add another tablespoon of sugar instead.
Streaky Bacon, roughly diced
Coarsely grated mature cheddar cheese. I used Barbers 24-month English clothbound cheddar for this recipe, however, any aged cheddar will work fine.

All the ingredients you need to make soda scones.

Equipment

To get started with this soda scone recipe, you’ll need a skillet to saute the bacon as well as a large mixing bowl, measuring spoons, a mixing spoon, a 6cm round biscuit cutter, a rolling pin, and baking trays. I generally line my baking trays with a Silpat baking mat, however, parchment paper or a tray with a nonstick surface will also give you a great surface to bake on.

A wire rack is also ideal for cooling the scones once they’ve been removed from the oven.

A pastry blender is optional, however it does make light work of incorporating the butter into the flour mixture. Alternatively, you can just use your hands.

The details

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius.
In a small skillet, saute the diced bacon on low to medium heat until just starting to brown. Remove the bacon from the pan onto a plate lined with paper towel to drain off any excess fat. Pop aside to cool.
In a large bowl, combine all the dry ingredients. Give them a good whisk in order to remove any lumps and aerate the flour.
Add the chopped butter pieces. Using your fingertips, and working quickly, rub the cubes of cold butter between your fingers to create a mixture that resembles coarse crumbs.
Add the grated cheese and bacon bits to the dry ingredients and stir through.
In a small bowl, combine the buttermilk and honey. Give them a quick mix with a fork to combine. In the dry mixture bowl, make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour the buttermilk mixture into the well. Using a wooden spoon, gently combine the wet ingredients into the flour, being careful not to overwork the dough. It should come together into a rough, scraggy, soft dough.
Pop the dough into a lightly floured surface and with a rolling pin, lightly roll the dough out to be about 3cm thick. Using the scone cutter, cut scones out of the dough and place them onto a lined baking sheet a couple of centimeters apart from each other.
Brush the top of the scones with a little extra buttermilk. Bake in a preheated oven for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown. Turn them onto a wire cooling rack to cool.

The dry ingredients are added to a large mixing bowl.

How to serve these Irish soda scones

These bacon and cheese soda scones are a delicious afternoon tea, served simply cut in half with a sharp knife and slathered with cold butter. Bonus points if it’s Irish butter!

Pop a scone on the side of a bowl of butternut pumpkin soup for a heartwarming cold-weather supper

Warm and alongside a Sunday morning fry-up of bacon, eggs, a cup of tea and all the weekend breakfast essentials.

Beef up a bowl of Irish beef stew by serving a scone on the side for dunking!

Cook’s Notes

Avoid twisting the cutter when cutting out scones. Twisting can cause the scones to spread rather than rise, losing the crumbly, fluffy layers. For the fluffiest scones, aim for the dough to rise upwards, not outwards.

On a hot day, consider freezing the butter before grating it coarsely into the bowl. Then, quickly work it through with your fingers in the flour mixture. Incorporate the butter quickly to avoid overworking the dough.

Achieving a good scone is about creating a light, fluffy texture. That’s why I whisk the dry ingredients to aerate them. Alternatively, sifting them into the mixing bowl can also aerate the flour.

Variations

Nix the bacon and stick to a cheesy soda scone instead.

Add some fresh herbs like chives for a bit of added flavor.

Storage

Fresh scones are best eaten on the day they are made. Alternately, once they are at room temperature, store them in an airtight container to eat the next day and warm them in the microwave for 10-20 seconds to bring them back to their just-out-of-the-oven freshness. Don’t be tempted to keep them longer.

Love an easy quickbread recipe? Here are a few more…

Happy scone baking!

Irish Bacon & Cheese Soda Bread Scones