Still licking my wounds from Monday’s flatbread disaster, I needed something to boost my spirits. A little pick-me-up. A little sumthin’ sumthin’ that would go with coffee. Enter my mother-in-law’s scone recipe!
1/3 cup margarine, butter, or shortening ( I use butter)
1 ¾ cups all purpose flour
3 tablespoons sugar
2 ½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 egg beaten
½ cup currants or raisins ( I use currants)
4-6 tablespoons half and half ( I use 2 percent and it works)
1 egg, beaten
Heat oven to 400. Cut 1/3 cup margarine into flour, sugar, baking powder and salt until mixture resembles fine crumbs. Stir in 1 egg ,the currants, and just
enough milk so dough leaves side of bowl. Turn dough onto lightly floured surface. Knead lightly 10 times. Roll ½ inch thick. You can cut 2 inch circles out but I just cut it in to 6 or 8 pie pieces. Place on ungreased cookie sheet. Brush with 1 egg. Bake until golden, 10-12 minutes. Immediately remove from cookie sheet
Cool 1 hour (I can’t wait that long)
You can freeze this. Freeze uncovered until completely frozen, at least 2 hours. Wrap in heavy-duty aluminum foil, label and freeze no longer than 2 months.
About 45 minutes before serving, remove from freezer and heat wrapped in 350 oven until warm , 30-35 minutes.
I was already a mess in the kitchen baking my bread for the week (more on this later) so I just kept right along and went after the scones. I didn’t have any currants or raisins on hand so I decided to use almonds instead. I didn’t use a rolling pin to roll it out, I just flattened it with my hands and it worked really well. Using a pizza cutter to slice the round, flat dough into eight pieces, I was feeling pretty good about myself. I put them on a cookie sheet and into the oven they went.
About seven minutes later I realized I’d forgotten to brush with them with the egg before popping them into the oven. If I’d tried it then I’d have scrambled egg topped scones. Nasty. So I let them finish without and hoped for the best. (I used the beaten egg to brush on my bread instead.)
What emerged from the oven is something I could be proud of. Not as golden brown and delicious as it could have looked, but let’s talk about the tasty scale. These were super yummy, had good texture and weren’t too dry. (Dry, yeah, but they’re scones…) Even Test Subject Bill (self-professed scone hater), when presented with almond scone, approved. (Though he complained about the nuts.)
Moments after I began digging into my afternoon snack, I dropped my scone onto the kitchen floor. $*#(! It was obscene. A tragedy. Luckily, I had seven back ups so a scone emergency was diverted.
Now, I promised more on the bread. I’ve been making two loaves per weekend since I started this endeavor a month or so ago. I’d been using the rapid rise yeast in packets but picked up a brick of regular active dry yeast at Costco. Today was the first time I used it. The dough ball felt lighter and fluffier, and the loaves puffed up considerably during the second rise. I just pulled them out of the oven and will report immediately on any taste/texture deviations from prior loaves once they cool off.
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