For those of you who blog stalk, this post is out of the ordinary for me. But since I love to bake and create culinary delights, it's not so far fetched that I would share this here. And being asked twice by two very dear women ... How could I refuse?
Not sure what possessed me but for the past week or two I have been craving scones--rich, buttery, melt-in-your-mouth-and-then-some scones.They don't exactly fit in with my turned-over-a-new-leaf-gotta-lose-this-weight diet. So you can understand my hesitation to fulfill the craving. Yesterday I gave in. What can I say, sometimes I'm weak. I sought out the highest starred scone recipe on the website allrecipes.com. Then I added my own little twist. The result is below:
And here is the recipe:
SIMPLE ORANGE SCONES
- 2 cups all-purpose flour - 8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, frozen*
- 1/3 cup sugar - 2 teaspoons finely grated orange rind
- 1 teaspoon baking powder - 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1/4 teaspoon baking soda - 1 large egg
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
1. Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. In a medium bowl, and using a fork, mix flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Grate butter into flour mixture on the large holes of a box grater. Use the fork to work in butter (mixture should resemble coarse meal), then stir in orange rind.
3. In a small bowl, whisk sour cream and egg until smooth.
4. Using the fork again (or a slender rubber spatula, which is what I used after scraping the sour cream mixture out of its bowl), stir sour cream mixture into flour mixture until large dough clumps form. The dough will be sticky in places and there may not seem to be enough liquid at first, but as you press, the dough will come together.
5. Place on a lightly floured surface and pat into a 7- to 8-inch circle about 3/4-inch thick. Sprinkle with 1 teaspoon of sugar. Use a sharp knife to cut into 8 triangles; place on a cookie sheet [preferably lined with parchment paper--I personally used my Pampered Chef cookie stone (no parchment) & it was perfect], about 1 inch apart. Bake until golden, about 15 to 17 minutes. Cool for 5 minutes, then drizzle icing over each scone.
ICING
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 teaspoon finely grated orange rind
- Hand squeeze juice from one large section of a fresh orange
1. In a small bowl, mix all ingredients to the desired consistency for spreading. Using a fork or knife, drizzle/spread icing over each scone.
* I froze my butter for 1-1/2 hours and it grated up easily with the metal box grater. I could have used the grater of my food processor (which would have been way faster), but didn't want the clean up afterward.
