Years ago I wanted to have an afternoon tea-themed bridal shower for my sister so I tried about 5 different scone recipes and all of them were just awful. Even my idol Martha Stewart had a crappy scone recipe. They all turned out like small hard blocks that you could throw at someone to knock them out. Finally Steve shared his own recipe with me and it was the best yet. I had stuck to this recipe for a really long time and it wasn’t until recently that I finally modified it because I was too lazy to run out to the store so I just used what I had in my fridge. These scones are great and my office staff usually devours them if Brandon doesn’t get to them first, with or without lemon or passion fruit curd.
 

 
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Sift all dry ingredients together in large mixing bowl. Cut the butter into small chunks and incorporate into the dry mixture either with your fingers or a pastry cutter until you can only see small pebbles of butter. Add the half and half and very gently combine with the dry ingredients until incorporated and knead no more than 3-4 times. Now stop and let it sit and rest for five minutes. Divide the mixture into whatever size you’d like your scones to be and very gently shape them. Don’t mess with the dough too much or else it will come out like dense bricks. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bake for about 14 minutes or until golden brown.