Skip to main content

Savory Scones

Scones are quick breads (using chemical leavening instead of yeast) (also ready in 20 minutes instead of a lockdown craft project) and a good thing to know about in general. This batch is destined for the freezer so I can pull out one or two to put in my lunchbox next week. You can use any cheese and add ins that you like, provided they're not too wet. Fresh or dried herbs are nice too.

Savory Scones
makes 12
2 cups/240 g all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter COLD
1/2 cup plus 1 Tbsp. buttermilk (or milk plus 1 tsp white vinegar)
1/3 cup grated cheese
2 strips crispy bacon, chopped
2 Tbsp. minced raw shallot

If you're using milk with vinegar, mix and let stand while you prep the rest.

Preheat oven to 350F and find a cookie sheet. If you like to use parchment, get out a sheet now. If you have a bench knife, it will come in handy. Otherwise a butter knife will do.

Mix the flour, baking powder and soda, and salt together. Give them a good stir so no one ends up with a mouthful of baking soda. Cut the butter into chunks and toss in the flour. Use your fingers, two knives or a pastry cutter to work the butter into the dry ingredients until you have fairly uniform sandy crumbs.

Add the mix ins and stir well. (Why? So they don't clump up in one section, leaving everyone else with plain scones. Also, once you've added the buttermilk you want to stir as little as possible to avoid developing the gluten.)

Stir in the buttermilk. It won't look like enough. Stir until dough mostly comes together, then turn out onto your parchment or counter and knead just until it's dough. Pat out into a circle 1" high (which happens to be the height of my baby & ring finger together. It does not have to be a perfect circle. Use your bench knife or butter knife to cut your circle into 12 pieces. Explode the circle by pulling each section back an inch or two. (This lets the sides get lovely and brown.) Pop into the oven for 15 - 20 minutes until golden brown. Let stand 5 minutes before eating, seriously, you'll burn your mouth.

These will get stale in a day, but they freeze really well. 

This recipe works with GF flour.

Vegans: use your favorite margarine and sub canned pumpkin thinned with water plus 1 tsp. vinegar for the buttermilk. Or whatever milk you use, but the canned pumpkin is awesome.





Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Chicken Fried Pork Chops

It’s critical to this recipe to recognize that “1/2 inch” is an actual measurement. Chances are one of your fingers is 1/2 inch wide, which is a handy bit of information to know. I like these pork chops with mashed potatoes, green beans and something tart like a chutney. Chicken Fried Pork Chops 1/2 cup a/p flour 1 tsp. garlic powder 1/4 tsp. smoked paprika 1 Tbsp. milk 1 egg 2 1/2-inch thick bone-in center-cut pork chops 1 tsp. kosher salt 1 cup neutral oil* (1 cup of milk for gravy if desired) In a shallow bowl big enough to hold a pork chop (a pie plate works great) mix together flour, garlic powder and paprika. In another shallow bowl, beat egg until it’s uniform looking – no streaks of plain white, because those will make inferior coating. In a perfect world, put a rack big enough to hold both pork chops unstacked in a tray. In an imperfect world, a platter with chopsticks or foil snakes will work just fine. Dry pork chops and salt both sides. Dip bot...
Post a Comment
Read more

Smashed Potatoes and Bacon Gravy

A couple of years ago ago, at a restaurant that was cute but ultimately disappointing*, I decided to order fried chicken with smashed potatoes and bacon gravy, and green beans with slivered shallots**. As any cook worth her salt will tell you, restaurant fried chicken is a foolish order. The best fried chicken is lightly floured*** and shallow-fried, producing plenty of nice fat and cracklins for milk gravy, which is IMHO the entire point of fried chicken. Restaurant fried chicken is usually heavily breaded and deep fried, and the gravy, if it exists at all, is a sad broth based thing, or nothing more than white sauce. Also I don't like chicken very much. Nonetheless, I ordered it because I had never considered putting bacon gravy on potatoes. Readers, it was a divine combination. The potatoes were buttery and slightly lumpy (in a good way) and the gravy was just the right texture, smoky and not too rich with a good dash of pepper. I made it the next week at home, and I'...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Return of Bargain Menus

It’s the return of the weekly menu! Here’s dinner for two for 6 nights (assuming you want leftovers or take out once a week) complete with shopping list & recipes. These menus assume that you know how to cook already, so it may call for something like cooked rice without telling you how to cook it. Most recipes are super flexible so you can substitute whatever is in your pantry or fridge at will. Tips for cooking, or for cooking ahead are included - if you see “ Save for future meals ” then set those ingredients aside for later in the week.   Since the original menus were meant to be low cost, they shopping lists don’t include a lot of luxury. If you have the extra funds you can toss in an avocado or fancier cheese. BARGAIN MENU B01 Saturday Fish Cakes Rice Peas Save for future meals cooked rice frozen peas egg yolk Tip:   Cook and refrigerate extra rice for Tuesday night. Sunday Waldorfish Salad Cheese Toasts Save for futu...
Post a Comment
Read more