Scone Confessions: DIY

As per request, here are a couple of the recipes of the scones mentioned in my previous post, Scone Confessions. Beware... you may have your own confessions to make soon...

Note: These recipes are not my own. I gratefully found them here and here. Though I often find for the majority of the scone recipes I look up, I have to make alterations, these two were perfect as originally directed. 

Blueberry Lemon

These were my first and remain my very favourite scones. They are so amazingly soft inside and just slightly crunchy/flaky on the outside. Using fresh lemon juice to make the glaze is spectacular, don't skip that part!

Ingredients:

2 cups flour
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
a pinch of salt
2 lemons zested
1/2 cup cold butter
1/2 cup whipping cream
1 egg
1 cup blueberries

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Whisk together the dry ingredients and lemon zest then cut in the butter (with a pastry blender!!! It's the only way people. Gotta go old school and do it by hand!) until the mixture resembles coarse sand.

In a separate bowl whisk together cream and egg. Add these to the dry mix and combine. This part gets a little tricky because you can either add the blueberries before and mix all together but they are more likely to burst that way. Or you can add them after the dough has formed but I found that they didn't incorporate well. So I like to mix the wet into the dry a little bit first then add the blueberries and mix a little more.

I am very particular with my scones and careful not to over-mix. It's okay if all the dry isn't all combined or the dough isn't all formed together. Turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and carefully knead it gently together and pat down to form a circle about 1 inch thick. (I really don't knead much at all, just mostly pat it enough to keep the dough together.) Cut into 8 triangles and transfer to baking sheet. Bake for 20-25 minutes. The bottoms will be slightly browned but these scones stay pretty light on top.

For the glaze:

Combine 1 cup of powdered sugar with 1 tbsp of fresh lemon juice (I usually do half of a small lemon). You want a glaze that is thick but still runs. Drizzle over the scones after they have cooled a bit.


Voila! Best scones EVER.

Raspberry Almond Scones

These darling scones are a little more effort because of the added steps of toppings but equally delicious. The crunch of nuts perfectly compliments the sweet raspberries hidden amongst the soft layers of scone.

Ingredients:

2 cups flour
1/4 cup sugar
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup sliced almonds (finely chopped)
1/2 cup cold butter
1 cup whipping cream
1/4 tsp almond extract (however I do not like almond extract so I used vanilla and it was delightful)
fresh raspberries (approx a cup - and they don't have to be fresh, I used frozen but these have a tendency to break into pieces)

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Mix dry ingredients and almonds in a bowl and cut in the butter (remember... pastry blender). Add cream and almond extract/vanilla, mix together. Add raspberries and gently stir to combine.

This dough is a little more wet than the blueberry scones above. Careful with those raspberries as they are prone to mush (or break) - however DON'T add them before the wet...you don't want dry ingredients filling up their hollow insides! Not so tasty...

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and form into a circle 1 inch thick. Cut into 8 pieces. Bake for 15-18 minutes until golden brown. Cool 5-10 before topping.

Toppings:

Mix together 1/2 cup sugar and 1/4 cup of almond crumbs

Raspberry sauce:

1/2 cup of sugar
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup raspberries

Add all ingredients to a saucepan. Set over medium heat and heat until mixture comes to a light boil, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 10-12 minutes. Pour through a sieve to remove the solids and allow to cool until ready to use.

Dip cooled scones into the syrup then into the sugar/almond topping. This makes them pink and sparkly on top. Super cute and delicious.


P.S. We used the extra syrup on ice cream a few nights later and it was delish!

And that's all for now. I'll have to post again with some more because my chai scones turned out AMAZING.