Saturday, April 3, 2010

Blueberry Scones from America's Test Kitchen

I'm not sure how you like your scones, I like mine light and fluffy and this is by far the best scone I ever had in my entire life. The secret in this recipe is to make sure that you freeze your butter first, then grate it and freeze it again. This allows the butter to get super cold and that is what makes those scones so light and wonderful. I haven't made them yet, but a friend of mine did, and believe me - the BEST scone ever! {Unless you like them crumbly, and dense this will not be what you are looking for.} I will be making them tonight for my Easter Brunch tomorrow morning, so I will post pictures and other comments in another post. :)



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Blueberry Scones
{Recipe from America's Test Kitchen}

  • 8 TBS unsalted butter
  • 1 1/2 cups fresh blueberries
  • 1/2 cup whole milk
  • 1/2 cup sour cream
  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp fresh lemon zest
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/4 tsp baking soda

Freeze your butter before you start. You can do it the night before, or a few hours before.
Preheat oven to 425 F. Line a baking sheet with parchment. Set aside. Grate the butter and set aside in the freezer, again. Freeze your blueberries until you need them in the folding process. Or use frozen ones.

Whisk the milk and sour cream together. Refrigerate until needed, so it stays cold.
In a large bowl, whisk the flour,1/2 cup sugar,baking powder, lemon zest,salt, and baking soda. Add the frozen, gated butter and mix until butter is coated with flour mixture. Fold in the cold milk/sour cream mixture, just until combined - important is not to overmix.

Turn the dough and any floury bits on a well floured counter-top. Flour your hands and the dough and knead for 6-8 times...be gentle. It should just hold together in a raggedy ball. It is a soft/wet dough. It will stick as you knead, so add a bit of flour to prevent it from sticking. I like to use a bench scraper to lift the dough off the counter-top.
Roll dough out in a 12 inch(or so) square. Fold the top and chill the dough in the freezer for about 5 minutes.

Flour your counter-top again. Roll the chilled dough again in a 12 inch square. Sprinkle the chilled berries evenly over the whole surface. Fold the sides of the dough to form a 4 inch square. Loosen the dough with a bench scraper. Roll the dough in a log. Turn the seam side down and press down on the log to form a 12x4 inch rectangle.With a floured knife, cut the dough in 4 small rectangles. Cut each rectangle in 2 triangles. Place the scones on a parchment lined baking sheet. Brush with melted butter and sprinkle with some raw sugar or regular. Bake for 18-25 minutes OR until light golden brown. Cool 10 minutes before serving.


Enjoy!

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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can not begin to even tell you how delicious these scones are!!! Every one who tried these couldn't believe a scone could be that moist and flaky. This is a MUST. only down side is they don't hold well over night. But you can freeze the unbaked scones and pop them into the oven for breakfast, they still taste great! TRY THIS RECIPE

Anonymous said...

These scones are quite delicious, but like many of the ATK recipes I've tried in the past, this recipe had some issues worth noting, ususally caused my the gimmicky, atypical methods the show comes up with for preparing their recipes.

Concentrating the blueberries to a single layer resulted in a very mushy center - the moisture caused many of the scones to slide apart during the cooking process, and fall apart after removal from the oven - This recipe would benefit if there were a way to more evenly distribute the blueberries throughout the scones

CactusHeart said...

To the poster who had problems evenly distributing the berries: I'm not sure where your difficulty is. This is exactly how I would've done it. Perhaps you could try dividing the berries into 2 portions, spread out one portion into a layer on a floured surface of the counter-top, gently lay the rolled out dough over the berries, lightly press then sprinkle the remaining layer of berries over that, making sure you press the berries so that they're as embedded into the dough as possible without crushing them or staining your hands. Frozen berries start making a mess pretty quickly, perhaps your issue is that they had sat out too long. If that's the situation, then it wouldn't hurt to roll the berries into a bowl of flour before adding them to the dough. That also happens to be a great trick in making muffins: giving the berries a light dusting of flour helps "anchor" them to the batter and prevents them from sinking to the bottom while baking.

Something about Alaska Fishing Lodge said...

I'd love to have one of these because they look absolutely delicious!