I’ll try to be short and sweet. Scones are amazing – these are flaky and fabulously rich. Sweet and brilliant with milk, coffee, or tea – you’d be a fool to not make your own. Just work fast and keep your ingredients cold! You’ll get a flaky, biscuit-like scone every time.
You’ll need:
Dry Ingredients
- 2 cups of all purpose flour; I used 1¾C AP and ¼C whole wheat pastry flour. The softer the flour, the better – try cake flour if you’ve got it.
- ½ cup of granulated sugar
- ½ cup of currants
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon lemon zest
Other Ingredients - a stick of butter (4 ounces = 8 tablespoons), frozen
- ¾ cup of heavy cream
You’ll also need:
- two bowls, about 4 quarts each
- a cheese (or other type of) grater
- a zester/microplaner
- a whisk
- a spatula
- rolling pin
- cutting board
- sharp knife
- a baking sheet (half pans work nicely)
- wax paper
- measuring cups/spoons
- one granny, or a resident-old-person
- And as always, clean hands (and likewise, all other tools)
Here’s how to do it:
- Working very quickly, grate the frozen butter into a bowl. Yes, with a cheese grater. You can very lightly coat the grater with oil to keep the butter from sticking, though its coldness should help. Once grated, return the curly butter to the freezer to firm up-about 20 minutes. Your hands really know how to melt butter’s heart.
- Mix the dry shit in a bowl. Use a wisk if you care to; use your hands if you don’t give a **** ’cause you a gansta. A scone-making gangsta. And don’t forget the salt and lemon zest, mother******.
- Okay, I don’t know what happened there. Take that cold butter out of the freezer and mix it into the dry ingredients. Coat the butter with flour, using your fingertips to gently and quickly mash it all together. You want to work fast so the butter doesn’t melt.
- At this point, you’ll have a flaky-flourish thing going on. Perfect time to add the heavy cream. It’s probably best to use a spatula here, unless you like having objectionably sticky fingers (until you realize how sticky AND tasty they are).
- Once the cream is incorporated evenly, you’ll have a flaky but workable mass of dough – flour your hands and give it a few good kneads to bring it all together. Flour your cutting board or clean work surface, as well as your rolling pin. Roll that ****er out to about ½ an inch thick. Place on wax paper and into the freezer to cool for about 5-10 minutes or until firm but workable.
- Flour your surface again and fold the dough into thirds. Roll it back to about ½ an inch thick and give it a turn, folding into thirds again. Do this two more times. This is how we build those flaky layers! If the dough starts getting soft, toss it back on the wax paper and into the freezer.
- The final roll should remain about one inch thick. Preheat your oven to 450°F and let the dough cool down one last time in the freezer. When the oven’s nice ‘n’ toasty, take your dough out and cut into into quarters, and cut each quarter once, yielding 8 triangle-ish scones. Lightly coat them with softened or melted butter.
- Place onto a baking sheet and into the oven for about 20 minutes, or until they start to get brownish. The good ol’ toothpick-trick can also be employed; they’ll feel a hint soft but will firm up as they cool. Remove to a rack to cool for about 10-15 minutes.
- Enjoy, with your *****-*** granny, or *****-*** granny substitute.