Of Coffee Scones

Oh no! Another scone recipe! I hope you're not tired of them yet, because I certainly am not. Just goes to show how much I adore scones. My recipe this time around is an off-shoot of the Earl Grey scones I made earlier. This time around, I thought why not add coffee instead of tea. After looking for advice from the Googler, I settled for using instant coffee powder. I mean, why use expensive espresso blends when you’re going to cook it anyway, right? Using the recipe for cream scones as a base, I simply heated the ½ cup of milk and added a tablespoon of instant coffee to it. I had to increase the amount of sugar added since the coffee I used cancelled out any of the sweetness from the sugar. (Yes, it was that strong and bitter. It was good quality instant coffee.) The only other thing lacking from it is a drizzle of Nutella. (Have I told you how much I adore that stuff?)

 Coffee Scones

½ cup milk

1 tablespoon instant coffee

2 cups all purpose flour

2/3 cup sugar

2 teaspoon baking powder

¼ teaspoon salt

1/3 cup butter, very cold and cut into small pieces

½ cup raisins or other dried fruit

1 large egg, cold

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 egg for the egg wash

In a saucepan, heat milk until it simmers. Add the tablespoon of instant coffee and stir until the granules are dissolved. Remove from the heat and set aside until cooled. (You can refrigerate if you want) In a large bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add the butter and either using your fingers or two knives or a pastry cutter, blend in the butter until the mixture looks like coarse crumbs. Set aside. In a smaller container (preferably with a spout), whisk together the egg, vanilla extract and the milk mixture. Pour this over the flour and butter mixture and stir until just combine. DO NOT OVER MIX. Once combined, transfer to a floured surface and knead into a ball and flatten the top. Using a knife dipped in flour or a cookie cutter, divide the mixture into 8 pieces and place on a greased cookie sheet. Brush a mixture of egg and water on each of scone. Bake in a 375F or 190C oven for 15-18 minutes. They’ll be nice and dark brown when cooked with the beautiful scent of coffee. The raisins will be great splash of sweetness in this bittersweet scone. 

The instant coffee that I used. It's a pretty good blend.

Of Banana Bread Scones

I love how soft the scone is.

I came about the next scone recipe because I was looking for another way to make scones. If you're on a diet and are watching the fat and sugar content of your food, this is the recipe for you. It's also great for those annoying overripe bananas. Yes, I find them annoying. It's called Banana Bread Scone and I found it on thekitchn.

This recipe isn't like any scone recipe I've come across before. First, the dough is quite wet. Second, part of the recipe required you to freeze the dough for about thirty minutes. That said, it smelled so good and it had the right amount of sugar in it. After cutting it, I realized that it was literally a cross between a scone and a banana bread. It was soft, but it wasn't as gooey and wet as a banana bread.

2 very ripe bananas (The ones I used were so ripe, they were practically falling apart when I peeled them)
3 tablespoons milk (the recipe said 2-4 tablespoons until it made 1 cup, but my bananas were so soggy, I had to forego the measuring part and just dumped them in a bowl with the milk)
1/2 cup plain cream (or yogurt)
2 1/2 cup all purpose flour
4 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon powder
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup walnuts (optional)

I mashed the bananas and added the milk in a bowl. Then I stirred in the cream. 

In a larger bowl, I combined the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. I cut in the butter until I had a coarse crumb mixture. If you're using walnuts, this would be the time to incorporate them. 

Since I wasn't using them, I went on to the next step, which was pouring in the banana-cream mixture. I stirred until the flour was just incorporated. Then I lined a plate with parchment paper and poured my dough over it, shaping it into a disk. I covered it with another sheet of parchment paper and placed it in the freezer for 30 minutes.

I preheated the oven to 400F or 200C. Then I removed the dough from the freezer and removed the first parchment paper. I inverted it into a parchment lined baking sheet and removed the second parchment paper. 

At this point, you can lice them into wedges (pull them apart a bit you plan to do so to give them room to expand) or bake it as is and slice it later. I chose to do the latter since our freezer wasn't able to harden the dough by much. Then I baked it for 25-30 minutes or until the edges had turned golden brown.

After mine came out of the oven, I cooled it for a bit before slicing it into triangles. 

In the recipe for thekitchn, they used a glaze to decorate the scone. Since I was cooking for my parents (who are starting to get old people problems), I decided to forego this part and just serve it plain with some fruit

The banana bread scone as it came out of the oven

Cutting more slices

Of Earl Grey Scones

Look at how gorgeous that brown scone is!

Lately, my interest in scones was piqued again. Now I know I've already blogged about scones (here), but humor me here. These two recipes will blow your mind. I've always made scones with either one of two recipes: the one I found on allrecipes and the one I found on joyofbaking. To make them more interesting, I would just change up the add-ons (for example using chocolate chips of caramel chips instead of currant etc.) Then I found some lavender in the herb section of a gourmet grocery store. All I knew about Lavender was that it was used in aromatherapy. Naturally I was curious about how to use lavender in food. That's when I read about Lavender scones, and that led me to looking for a scone recipe that played with our sense of smell.

I love how the egg wash just gives it that beautiful sheen

So, here's the first of two recipes:

Earl Grey Scones
2 tea bags of Earl Grey tea (Or 3-4 teaspoons of Earl Grey tea if you're using loose leaf tea)
1/2 cup milk
2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1/2 cup currants
2 eggs
3 tablespoon milk

The first thing you should do is is heat the milk to almost boiling and allow the tea to steep in the milk. Allow it milk-tea mixture to cool before using. Before using the currants, soak them for a few minutes and completely drain them before use
Then in a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add the butter and using your fingers or a pastry blender, blend until the mixture reminds you of coarse crumbs. Stir in the currants. Set aside.
Strain the tea and milk mixture (or remove the teabags) into another bowl and add one egg. Whisk together until combined and pour it into the dry ingredients. Using a fork, stir until all the flour is just wet. Be sure not to over mix.
Place the dough on a lightly floured surface a knead lightly (no more than 5 times), then shape into a ball. Pat the top until it is slightly flat, then cut into 8 triangles. Make an egg wash with the last egg and the 3 tablespoons of milk. Brush each triangle and bake for 15-18 minutes or until brown and a tooth pick comes out clean in a 190C or 375F oven.

Of Scones

I love scones. The recipe for scones is usually simple enough that when I was a kid, I really really wanted to bake them. There was just one problem. I didn't quite know what they were and how they should turn out. But, it was a good start for a ten-year old starting baker. It wasn't until college (and with the help of Google) that I really started baking them. I also started experimenting with the recipe. The first successful recipe I followed is from Allrecipes.com. It was (and still is) a 5-star recipe, and that's basically why I chose to use it.

Here it is below:

 2 cups all purpose flour

1/3 cup sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

 8 tbsp or 1/2 cup butter (cold)

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 sour cream

1 large egg

1. Preheat oven to 400F or 200C. (I know it 400F is actually 204. 44C, but trust me, it won't matter)

2. Shift flour, baking powder and baking soda into a bowl. Add sugar and salt. Mix.

3. Cut butter into smaller pieces and add to flour mixture.

4. Using your fingers, work butter into the flour mixture until you get the consistency of cornmeal.

5. Add raisins and mix.

6. In a different bowl, whisk together sour cream and egg. Pour this into the dry mixture and whisk with a fork until everything is just moist.

7. Place this mixture onto a floured surface and form a ball.

8. At this point you may sprinkle an additional 1 tablespoon sugar or brush with either an egg wash or milk. Then using a lightly floured knife divide the ball into 8 pieces. Place on a greased or lined cookie sheet.

9. Bake for 15-17 minutes until golden.

Read more at: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/simple-scones/detail.aspx

Chocolate chip scones served with milk. The Florida's Natural is just there because it's grapefruit flavour, which I never got when I was in Florida.

That's the basic recipe. Here's what else you can do with this recipe:

a) Instead of using sour cream, you can use unflavoured yoghurt. I've tried this once when my family was in Doha, Qatar and for some reason I couldn't find sour cream. It works quite well. The texture is pretty much the same.

b) You can also add a little orange zest or lemon zest. It won't affect the flavour, but it does make it smell so good.

c) Substitute raisins with chocolate chips, nuts, other dried fruits or fresh blueberries. Basically anything that's about the size of a raisin and is edible.

d) You can also use a cookie cutter to form the scones if you want. 

e) Another recipe I used is from the website joyofbaking.com. This recipe uses only 1/4 cup sugar, only 1/3 cup butter and 1/2 cup milk or half-and-half or heavy cream instead of sour cream. It also asks for some vanilla extract. It's still a very good recipe. Note, though, if you do decide to use heavy cream, be prepared for the richness of flavour that you'll get. Very rich, but oh so delicious. (http://www.joyofbaking.com/scones.html)

f) On the same website, there is also a recipe for jam-filled scones where you divide the dough into 2, forming each into a circular disc. Then spreading jam on one disc and topping it off with the other before cutting and baking. (http://www.joyofbaking.com/SconesfilledwitheJam.html)

The possibility is almost endless with scones and it's quite hard to go wrong them. It's a perfect recipe for those who are just starting out.

Note: Scones are usually served with Devonshire cream and jam. I never actually tried it with either, but if you're planning an English tea party, these two might make it a bit more authentic. 

Isn't the little fishy cute?