Many people are now enjoying lounging in their gardens to bask in the sunshine, and if you are a tea drinker, then why not indulge yourself with a buttery scone? It may seem simple to buy scones from the supermarket, but they are incredibly easy to make yourself at home with this simple recipe.

It only takes 10 minutes to prepare scones before sticking them in the air fryer to bake for eight minutes, so you have huge, homemade and fluffy scones in no time at all. However, Beth Sachs, a Cornwall cook and founder of Effortless Foodie, has shared the key to making tastier scones in an air fryer is to add a little lemon juice to the dough.

She said: “A squeeze of fresh lemon juice sours the milk to produce light and fluffy textured scones.”

Lemon juice is needed when baking scones as it will react to the baking soda in the recipe to help them rise when cooking in the air fryer.

The acid in lemon juice weakens the flour, so the dough will be much more tender, and it also helps make the scones fluffy.

However, the biggest reason to add lemon juice is that it will curdle milk to create buttermilk, which makes scones moist so they stay fresh longer and will also create a golden crust on top of the scones.

Adding just a little lemon juice greatly enhances the texture of your homemade scones, so making them in the air fryer will be hardly any effort at all.

How to make air fryer scones 

Ingredients

• 175g of self-raising flour
• Half a teaspoon of baking powder
• 45g of cubed butter (cold from the fridge)
• Two tablespoons of caster sugar
• 85ml of milk (plus extra to glaze the top)
• A squeeze of lemon juice
• Half a teaspoon of vanilla extract

Instructions

To begin, preheat your air fryer at 200C for 10 minutes as you prepare the ingredients.

Place the flour, baking powder and cubed butter into a large mixing bowl. Make sure you are using cold butter straight from the fridge, as it keeps the dough firm and easy to handle, so you do not accidentally overwork it.

Use your fingers to rub the butter and flour together until you have a breadcrumb-like consistency. Once the flour and butter are fully incorporated, mix in the caster sugar.

Pour the milk into a heatproof bowl, then cook in a microwave for 30 seconds, then add the lemon juice and vanilla extract. Let the milky mixture sit for two minutes to curdle, and then stir it into the flour mixture.

Spread some flour onto a clean kitchen surface. Shape the dough with your hands and then spread it on the counter. It should feel sticky and soft.

Beth said: “You don't need a rolling pin to roll out the dough. Just shape it with your hands into a disc shape. The more sparingly you handle the dough, the better the end result.”

Roll the dough into a round disc that is around three centimetres thick. Use a five-centimetre cookie cutter to cut out five scones from the dough. Keep reforming the dough into a disc until you have used it all up.

Brush a little bit of milk on top of the scones. Then all you need to do is place them in the air fryer basket and bake at 200C °c for seven to air minutes.

Once the air fryer is done, you should have golden brown and fluffy scones. Let them cool for 10 minutes, then your mouth-watering scones will be ready to serve.