Mother’s Day is about one thing for me. Well, other than mothers, that is.

Making a dodgy breakfast with burnt toast and overcooked scrambled eggs might be traditional, but surely baking a basket of warm scones to have as a teatime gift is far better for the overworked mum in your life.

Now, ‘scone’ covers a multitude of versions, but whether you make yours with lemonade or buttermilk, dates or pumpkin, mascarpone or white chocolate, certain rules need to be followed. Below, handed down by my mythical grandmother on her deathbed as a parting gift to her favourite grandson before she punted off over the Styx, are the The 12 Commandments of Scone-Making.  Please note that sconemaking is far more complex than the set of biblical principles that underpin both Judaism and Christianity. That requires a mere 10 commandments.

You’ll find my classic scone recipe here where it has received the coveted five-star rating from all who have made them so far. So if you balls them up don’t blame me;  blame your oven or your disobedience in failing to follow the commandments to the letter. Just like Yahveh in the earlier books of the Bible, the Scone Gods can be vengeful and spiteful when they see that sort of behaviour.

Jam or cream – what’s first?
That’s the sort of big question we discuss at MasterChef  when Heston’s in town – and it divides us. Us three judges think it’s jam first; otherwise you risk the jam falling off the thick pillow of cream. Mr Blumenthal has another view – that the cream should occupy the base position since it’s replacing butter on the scone and this way you don’t coat your palate with the fat of the cream first when you bite into your scone. This may be because in the UK the classic Devonshire tea is served with thicker clotted cream, which has a much higher fat content – at least 55 per cent butter fat compared with 35 per cent for standard Aussie thickened cream and 45 percent or more for double (thick) cream. Clotted cream is also more dense and a lot less wobbly.

In a recent Taste poll that asked whether jam or cream should go first on a scone, of the 18,000 people who voted 17,000 said jam first.

Scones can be savoury
Remember that scones are so much more than a sweet teatime treat. Thick herb scones go well with soup or step them up by making the zucchini and cheddar scones or the sweet potato scones with beetroot jam and crème fraîche.

Make a cobbler
Use that scone dough as a topping for your next beef stew or stewed pot of rhubarb or peaches. This is called a cobbler and originated on the wagon trains of America’s early settlers where pioneer ingenuity meant baking over the campfire in a Dutch oven – a heavy metal or cast-iron covered pot – rather than in a traditional oven. Remember to flavour the dough to match the filling. Maybe cheddar and parsley with that beef stew or a little extra sugar (preferably demerara) sprinkled on the scones during cooking for a rhubarb filling, or a few pine nuts or almonds whizzed into the scone mix for a peach cobbler. Although a tasty cheddar scone dough dolloped and cooked on top of stewed apple slices has no little attraction.

When is a biscuit a scone?
In the south-west of the US fluffy savoury scones are called ‘biscuits’ and traditionally made with buttermilk. So, take your favourite scones on a trip to the US and serve them with ‘gravy’, a sort of white sauce made with dripping (preferably lard but chicken schmalz will do) and fried crumbled pork sausage meat for a favourite Southern breakfast. Fancy up this ‘gravy’ by adding thinly sliced sage or fennel seed.

The 12 commandments of scone-making

1. Follow the recipe.

2. Or don’t follow the recipe. Well, follow it a bit but feel free to substitute fizzy lemonade for the milk for lighter scones or cream for richer ones.

3. Don’t knead the mix; just lightly pull together the ingredients or your scones will be rubbery, bullety or hard.

4. Use a blunt knife to cut the ingredients together. This helps avoid developing the gluten in the flour, which results in tough scones.

5. Be equally light-fingered when rolling out the dough. Minimal pressure, please, and do it only once.

6. Flour your bench lightly. Scone mixture should be quite wet and it will suck up extra flour, making for a heavier dough.

7. Cut out the scones with a sharp-edged cutter (or glass) and with only direct downward pressure. Blunt cutters and twisting will impact on the rise by compressing the edges.

8. Pack the scones close together on the baking tray so they can support each other as they rise and can’t spread too much.

9. Make scones the day you want them and eat them warm from the oven.

10. For a soft top on your scones, brush them with milk halfway though baking.

11. Bake your batch of scones in a very hot oven.

12. Wrap your scones in a clean tea towel straight out of the oven to keep them warm.