Chocolate Chip Scones

After my last success with making scones, I had promised myself that I’ll try another batch soon.. So when my son announced that he was hungry, I decided to bake  some scones. And as he too had a sweet tooth like me , I finalized the Chocolate Chip Scones.

Recipe Source
Joy of Baking  

Ingredients

 

• All purpose  flour – 2 cups (260 grams)
• granulated white sugar- 1/4 cup (50 grams)
• baking powder – 1 1/4 teaspoon
• baking soda – 1/4 teaspoon
• salt – 1/4 teaspoon
• unsalted butter, cold and cut into pieces – 1/2 cup (113 grams)
• milk or semi sweet chocolate chips or chunks – 1/2 cup (90 grams)
• dried cherries or cranberries – 1/2 cup (75 grams)
• pure vanilla extract – 1 teaspoon
• buttermilk – 2/3 – 3/4 cup (160 – 180 ml)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C) and place rack in middle of oven. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
3. Cut the butter into small pieces and blend into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. (The mixture should look like coarse crumbs.)
4. Stir in the chocolate chunks (or chips) and dried cherries.
5. In a small measuring cup whisk together the buttermilk and vanilla extract and then add to the flour mixture. Stir just until the dough comes together (add more buttermilk or flour as necessary). Do not over mix the dough.
6. Transfer to a lightly floured surface and  dough gently four or five times and then pat the dough into a circle that is about 7 inches (18 cm) round and about 11/2 inches (3.75 cm) thick.
7. Cut this circle in half, then cut each half into 4 pie-shaped wedges (triangles). Place the scones on the baking sheet. Brush the tops of the scones with a little milk.
8. Bake for about 15 to 20 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool.

Makes 8 scones.

The scones came out well.with a crisp crust and soft center. .and they were finished off in no time  🙂

P.S: Sending this to Bake-off round up at Versatile Kitchen , A.W.E.D-British Event by Reva and DK

Scones

It was our wedding anniversary on the 16^th this month and my hubby presented me a new SLR camera. He knew that was what I wanted most at the moment as my previous camera had problems with the flash and zoom functions… (All the nice snaps for the blog till date was taken by my dear bro…).

After impatiently waiting till the battery was charged I played with my new toy for a while (getting to know the settings and functions…) And I was pleased with the results… the light, zoom functions were far better than the one I had.. I didn’t want to wait to take a snap for the blog, so thought why not bake something. Browsed through the sites and finally settled on scones. (Like using an SLR, making scone was also a first time for me.. :))

The scone is something in between a bread and biscuit..  crisp on the outside and soft inside..  “ The scone is a small British quick bread (or cake if recipe includes sugar) of Scottish origin. British scones are often lightly sweetened, but may also be savoury.” – Wikipedia.

The recipe tells to use cold butter cut into pieces and to cut into the flour using pastry cutter or two knives. I didn’t have a pastry cutter with me. So I used two knives and moved them in a X pattern till the butter was blended with the flour. I read later that you can use a fork also to achieve this. The key is to make the butter pieces smaller and smaller with each pass, until all the butter and flour is incorporated and resembles coarse powder. Another thing is , the cooking time in the recipe says 20 minutes, but I guess it varies according to your oven. Mine were ready by 12 minutes, so just keep an eye on the scones when they are in the oven..  As this was my first trial with scones I wanted to keep the cooking process  simple..maybe next time I would try more variations like adding fruits or oats..

The scones popped fresh from oven tasted really great . My family loved the scones .. and I was happy clicking away the snaps..

Recipe Source
Joy of baking

Ingredients

• all purpose flour – 2 cups (260 grams)
• granulated white sugar – 1/4 cup (50 grams)
• baking powder- 1 teaspoon
• baking soda- 1/2 teaspoon
• salt – 1/4 teaspoon
• unsalted butter, cold and cut into pieces – 1/2 cup (113 grams) (1 stick)
• buttermilk – 2/3 – 3/4 cup (160 – 180 ml)
• vanilla extract – 1 teaspoon

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C) and place rack in middle of oven. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
3. Cut the butter into small pieces and blend into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. The mixture should look like coarse crumbs.
4. Add the buttermilk and vanilla extract to the flour mixture and stir just until the dough comes together. Do not over mix.
5. Transfer the dough to a lightly floured surface and  knead the dough gently and form into a round that is about 1 inch (2.5 cm) thick. Use a 2 1/2 inch (6.5 cm) round biscuit cutter to cut the dough into circles.
6. Transfer the scones to the baking sheet and brush the tops of the scones with a little milk.
7. Bake for about 20 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
8. Remove from oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool. Dust with icing sugar and serve.