Ever since I discovered afternoon tea my favourite part of the whole ordeal was always the scones. I set out to create my ideal scone recipe, meaning soft and fluffy, buttery, and delicious of course. I typically love scones with clotted cream and jam, but the clotted cream is a bit difficult to find in my area, so I always enjoy these with butter and jam, or even plain, glazed, with mascarpone, or whipped cream is truly delicious. The flavour combinations are endless, but one thing is for sure, these will be the best scones you’ve ever had! I am so happy to finally share my recipe with you all, as i’ve been making these for years, and have perfected my recipe. This time of year is when I really love to have a delicious scone with my coffee for breakfast. It even makes a love addition to a Christmas morning brunch. So without further ado, here is the surprisingly easy recipe for these delicious scones! If you would like to watch how I made these, the video tutorial is HERE.
Ingredients:
3 Cups Flour (all purpose)
1/2 Cup Sugar
2 Tbsp Baking Powder
1/2 Tsp Salt
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1/2 Cup Butter (unsalted, cold)
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1 Cup Milk
1 Large Egg
1 Tbsp Vanilla Extract
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1/2 Cup Raisins (optional)
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Additional egg or cream (or both) for brushing on top)
Notes:
*I like to separate these ingredients in order of use so that it’s easier to understand how we will be incorporating these.
*I also personally love the addition of raisins in my scones, especially golden raisins, but you can swap these out for anything, such as dried cranberries, etc… You can add your favourite zest, or even swap out the vanilla extract for something else such as rum, or almond… or you can completely leave these out all together for plain scones. The choice is yours. *In the video I believe I accidentally said 1/4 of a cup, but I used 1/2 a cup.
*I typically add cold butter, but it doesn’t have to be overly cold, even cool to room temperature is fine here.
*I use a food processor as it is SO easy, and i’m always looking for ways to use it, but you can do these by hand as well.
Instructions:
Add to the food processor the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder, salt) and pulse to incorporate.
Next add the cold butter, and pulse until sandy. You can even mix on a high speed until you see the butter fully combined. Your flour mix will look a bit sandy.
Finally add the wet ingredients (milk, egg, extract) and pulse only a few times until dough comes together. This happens fairly quickly and it is really important not to over mix at this stage. Just a few pulses will do.
On a lightly floured surface remove your dough carefully from the food processor, and pour on top your raisins. You can sprinkle a bit of extra flour on top so that it doesn’t stick to your fingers, and work in the raisins if you are using them until just mixed in. If you are not using raisins you will still need to do this with your dough and finish it by mixing and folding with your hands. Again do not over mix. Form into a disk shape and cover with plastic wrap. This is a soft dough, so we will be refrigerating this dough for at least 1 hour. You can refrigerate this dough the night before baking so that you can bake these off fresh in the morning. These scones are best eaten fresh, but they will keep in an air tight container or bread basket for about 4 days (though they have never lasted this long in my home).
If you do not have a food processor, you can do these by hand… cutting in the butter. It will take a bit more elbow grease, but they come together fairly easily by hand and the results are the same.
If you would like to watch the step by step video, you can do that HERE.
After the hour in the fridge or overnight you are now ready to roll these out, and bake the scones.
Forming and Baking Instructions:
Set the oven to 425F.
Remove the scones from the plastic wrap and place onto a lightly floured surface. You can also lightly flour on top of the dough.
Roll out this dough to be quite thick (about 1 inch thick). Even straight from the fridge this dough is quite soft and workable.
Then take a cookie cutter (I use one that is approximately 2.5 inches), or you can even use a glass or jar if needed, and cut out round disks.
Place each disk on a parchment paper lined baking sheet, giving them room in between to rise and expand.
Brush the top of the scones with either an egg, or cream, or both as I often do, adding just a splash of cream to my egg and giving that a mix.
Bake at 425F for about 12 to 14 minutes or until doubled in size and golden brown.
If you are making smaller scones you may even bake these for less than 12 minutes, so keep an eye on these. If you find your oven does not always cook evenly, feel free to rotate the pan half way through baking. I like to bake these on the middle rack of my oven.
Remove from the oven and place onto a wire rack to cool. You can eat these after 10 minutes or whenever you’d like, but they are best eaten warm and fresh out of the oven.
As I said earlier scones are best with clotted cream and jam, but if you do not have access you can even use butter, or mascarpone is also a great substitute. You can eat these plain, or glazed, or with whipped cream and fresh fruits. These scones are not too sweet so feel free to add sweet toppings such as honey and butter. The choice is yours.
There you have it! Can you believe how easy it is to make these scones? They are so wonderful and delicious and reminiscent of what you would have on the best of afternoon tea trays. I am so happy to be sharing this recipe with you, right on time for the holiday season. Merry Christmas if you are celebrating, or else happy baking!
Love: Lisa (@ladolcelisa) on YouTube & Instagram
https://youtu.be/f6SQ7J48B10
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