Over the Christmas break I ate  a lot of sugar.  This was not your run of the mill indulgence in Christmas cake  and the odd  box of roses, this was gluttony of the highest order.

Mid way through the holidays I was forced to  retire to bed due to ‘overdoing’ it with a certain banoffee pie, but this was not  the last straw for me (it really ought to have been).  The last straw came when I could not manage a second piece of  stollen at the home a friend.  I felt weak, shaky and nauseas – think it is referred to as a sugar hangover.  This particular stollen hailed from a small family bakers in Germany and was exquisite. I was unable to take one more bite!  I was done.

I have talked on the blog before about my failure to find my sugar off switch and my belief that it is addictive (for some at least).  Seems I am an early adopter for once as this view seems to be everywhere just now.

So yet again I took the decision to ditch added sugar as much as I could.  No sweets, cakes, chocolate or biscuits, as little processed food as possible (never going to ditch ketchup), and rejecting any food that has sugar in the top three ingredients.

I draw the line on fruit – fruit is good for you and I can’t cope with the idea that fruit is in any way evil.

Trouble is I find giving up these things harder than giving up smoking and harder than tackling a dry January, so roll in the substitutes!

My favourite substitute ‘de moment’ is SAVOURY SCONES.  They look cakey, they feel cakey and despite being savoury they taste sort of cakey.

I got started with a fantastically simple recipe from www.bbcgoodfood.co.uk for Mediterannean Scones which were flavoured with olives, sun dried tomatoes and lovely crumbly feta.  Served warm with lashings of salty butter these would be brilliant as part of a savoury spread of continental meats and cheeses,  but also worked brilliantly on their own with a nice cup of mint tea and as a nice breakfast alternative.  I was hooked! They take about 10 minutes to make, 20 minutes to cook and they taste superb.

I started to experiment buy adding alternative ingredients.  So far I have tried:

• Grated Cheddar and Courgette
• Parmesan and Spring Onion
• Pancetta and Parmesan

You can find the recipe on http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1867/mediterranean-scones.

Have you any other great ideas for savoury scones?  Tell me and I will try them, I am on a roll.