Lingonberry Coconut Scones

It's been a long while since my last blog post. My hiatus was mainly because (1) I was busy with house shifting in December, (2) January was busy baking for Chinese New Year, (3) February was away for a holiday in Europe. Finally I get to settle down now. Testing out my new oven with existing recipes. I also bought a new steam bake oven and trying it out with existing recipes. So many things to try, but so little time on hand!

In order to test out my new smaller oven, I try it with scones. The heat was more intense than the bigger oven. Has to watch the oven very closely. Needs to do more recipes in order to understand my new ovens.

Recipe for Lingonberry Coconut Scones, adapted from Delia.
(Makes 17 minis, approx. 1.5" diameter)

Ingredients:
225g Self-raising flour
40g Caster sugar
75g Salted butter, cold, cubed
20g Lingonberries (or other dried berries)
40g Toasted desiccated coconuts
1 Whole egg, approx. 55g, beaten
45g Whole milk
Some milk for brushing

Method:
1. Place flour and sugar into a bowl.
2. Rub the butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture looks crumbly.

3. Add in dried fruit and desiccated coconuts.

4. Pour in the beaten egg and milk.
5. Mix with a spatula, bringing the mixture together using your hands. The dough should come together.
6. Form the dough into a ball and turn it out onto a lightly floured working surface.
7. With a floured rolling pin, roll it out very lightly to a thickness of about 3cm. 
8. Then take the pastry cutter and tap it sharply so that it goes straight through the dough – do not twist or the scones will turn out a strange shape!
9. When you have cut as many as you can, knead the remaining dough together again and repeat. 
9. Then place the scones on the baking sheet, and brush with milk.

10. Bake in a preheat oven of 200C for approximately 10mins. 
11. When they’re done they will have risen and turned a golden brown. 
12. Remove them to a cooling tray and serve very fresh, split and spread with butter and jam.

Mini Wholemeal Scones

A quick and simple way to make breakfast, is to bake scones.

Recipe for Mini Wholemeal Scones, adapted from "Okashi"
(Makes approx. 21 mini scones)

Ingredients:
50g Wholemeal flour
170g Top flour
1 Tbsp Baking powder
30g Caster sugar
1/2 tsp Salt
80g LIV Unsalted butter, cold and cube
110g Egg yolk and milk mixture (combine 1 egg yolk with enough fresh whole milk to make up to the amount)

Method:

1. Combine flour, sugar and salt in a bowl.
2. Add butter and use your fingertips to rub flour into butter until mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs.
3. Add milk and egg yolk mixture and mix with a scraper.
4. Pour dough on a floured surface and knead lightly. Roll out to a thickness of 1.5-2cm.
5. Dust a 2-cm pastry cutter with flour, then cut out as many rounds of dough as possible.
6. Place rounds on a baking tray as near as possible, and brush with milk.
7. Bake at 190C fan oven for 13mins until scones are golden brown.
8. Remove from heat and cool on a wire rack.
9. Serve scones warm with jam and cream.

Wholemeal Chia Seeds Scones

This post is sponsored by Liv butter. Try Liv today!


Recipe for Wholemeal Chia Seeds Scones
(Makes approx. 36 mini scones)

Ingredients:
125g Wholemeal flour
250g Self raising flour
2.5 tsp Baking powder, heaped
15g Caster sugar
100g Liv Unsalted butter, cold & cubed
3 tsp Chia Seeds
25g Pumpkin seeds, toasted
2 Eggs
110g Whole milk

Method:

1. Place wholemeal flour,self-raising flour, baking powder and caster sugar into a large bowl. Mix well.
2. Rub in the cold butter with your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.
3. Add in the the chia seeds and pumpkin seeds. Mix well.
4. Make a well in the centre and pour in the beaten eggs and milk. Mix with a wooden spoon, starting from the centre of the well and stirring outwards until you have a sticky dough.
5. Cover the bowl with clingfilm or a damp cloth and leave to rest for 5 mins.
6. Knead the dough for 2 mins until it is smooth and elastic. Rest the dough for another 5 mins.
7. Roll out the dough to a rectangle. Then fold the dough, roll it out flat again, fold again and roll it out.
8. Then roll it to approximately 1/2 inch thick and use a 2 inch fluted cutter to cut out the scones, re-rolling the trimmings as necessary.
9. Place it on a baking tray and brush with milk. Bake in the preheated oven of 200C for 12mins or until it's golden brown.
6. Serve warm with whipped cream and jam.

More Scones Please!

It's scones craze for me lately. Probably because there was demand for it, by my sisters. When there is demand, there'll be motivation to bake. That explained why I've been baking so much scones lately. I "discussed" with NEL about baking scones and she also shared some tips with me. Thanks NEL again! :)

I had wanted to try her recipe, but changed my mind as I had a baking book with me. I tried this Leon's Scones from bake-a-boo bakery cookbook.

Previously, I read some information about scones like, don't knead, don't use your fingertips etc. However, this book seemed to do all the opposite about what I knew! Out of curiousity on how it will turned out, I tried it. Surprisingly, besides being really bland, it smell milky and nice. You definitely need some whipped cream and jam to go with this scone.

Recipe for Leon's Scones, extracted from bake-a-boo.
(Makes approx. 18 mini scones)

Ingredients:
375g Self raising flour
1.5 tsp Baking powder, heaped
75g Unsalted butter, cubed
2 Eggs
110g Whole milk

Method:

1. Sift the flour and the baking powder in a large mixing bowl, then rub in the butter with your fingertips until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.
2. Make a well in the centre and pour in the beaten eggs and milk. Mix with a wooden spoon, starting from the centre of the well and stirring outwards until you have a sticky dough. Cover the bowl with clingfilm or a damp cloth and leave to rest for 5 mins.
3. Lightly dust a work surface with flour, then knead the dough vigorously for 2 mins until it is smooth and elastic. Rest the dough for another 5 mins.
4. Roll out the dough to approximately 1/2 inch thick and use a 2 inch fluted cutter to cut out the scones, rerolling the trimmings as necessary.
5. Place it on a baking tray and brush with milk. Bake in the preheated oven of 200C for 10-12mins or until it's golden brown.
6. Serve warm with whipped cream and jam.

I also proceed to try NEL's recipe. However, I tweaked it and added more ingredients to make it more interesting. This definitely tastes better than the plain scones I made earlier!

Recipe for Wholemeal Cranberry Scones, modified from NEL's scones.
(Makes approx. 15 regular scones)

Ingredients:
105g Unsalted butter, cold and cubed
230g Top flour
100g Wholemeal flour
6 tsp Baking powder
1/8 tsp Salt
70g Caster sugar
180g Whole milk
37g Instant oat
80g Cranberries

Method:

1. In a large mixing bowl, sift together top flour and baking powder. Add in wholemeal flour.
2. Mix in sugar and salt.
3. Using a scraper, mix in the cold butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
4. Mix in the instant oat and cranberries.
5. Make a well in the centre and add in milk. Stir with a spatula until just combined. Knead gently a few times. The mixture will be a little sticky, moist and lumpy. If dough is not firm enough, chill it first. (Though I proceed to roll it out on a flour-dust top, which explained the shape of my scones).
6. Roll the dough into a round disc about 3/4 inch thickness.
7. With a round cutter, cut out the doughs into 15 pieces.
8. Place the scones on a greased baking tray, place them close to one another. Brush the tops with some milk.
9. Bake in preheated oven at 190C for about 15 minutes or until they are well risen and the tops are a light golden brown. Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool. Serve warm.

This is good enough to eat it on its own!

Wholemeal Scones

The temptation to bake and eat scones started last week when my sisters and I had scones at The Pavilion, Sentosa Resort and Spa. We were still harping over how good the scones tasted.

That prompted me to venture to Bakertan and Happy Home Baking's blog. I recalled they had very detailed write up on their experience with scones. Thanks to them, I don't have to surf further to understand more about scones! Finally, to replicate what I had at Sentosa, I used HHB's Cranberry Oatmeal Scones recipe. The result? Divine!

Recipe for Wholemeal Scones, modified from HHB's Cranberry Oatmeal Scones recipe.

Ingredients:
(makes 12 3" round scones)

300g Top flour
100g Wholemeal wheat flour
4 tsps  Baking powder
4 tbsps Caster sugar
1/8 tsp Salt
130g Unsalted butter, cold, cut into small cubes
40g Instant oat
180g Whole milk
100g Raisins

Method:
1. Soak raisins in some water for 15mins. Drain well and set it aside.
2. In a large mixing bowl, sift together top flour and baking powder. Add in wholemeal flour.
3. Mix in sugar and salt.
4. Using a scraper, mix in the cold butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. (I learn this from Rei, so as to prevent the butter from melting.) It is important that the butter should be cold so when it is cut into the flour mixture it becomes small, flour-coated crumbs.
5. Mix in the instant oat and raisins.
6. Make a well in the centre and add in milk. Stir with a spatula until just combined. The mixture will be sticky, moist and lumpy.
7. Gather up the mixture and place it on a lightly floured surface and give it a few light kneading (not more than 10 seconds) so that it comes together to form a dough. Do Not over work the dough. (Only mix the dough until it comes together. Too much kneading will cause gluten to develop, and the resulting scones will turn hard and chewy. Knead only until the ingredients come together into a combined mass.)
8. Pat the dough into a round disc about 3/4 inch thickness.
9. With a round cutter, cut out the doughs into 12 pieces.
10. Place the scones on baking tray, space them apart. Brush the tops with some milk.
11. Bake in preheated oven at 200 degC for about 12 minutes or until they are well risen and the tops are a light golden brown. Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool. Serve warm.

Thanks Bakertan and HHB for sharing so generously!

Raisin Scones

I got out of bed on Sunday early morning, remembering that we didn't buy breakfast for the kids on Saturday. Flipping through my stacks of unfiled recipes, I was looking for scones. I remembered seeing some easy scones quite sometime back. Finally I found the recipe to bake-Raisin Scones from Fenying.

Recipe for Raisin Scones

Makes 8 2-inch round scones with 1-inch height

Ingredients:

A

250g Self Raising flour

30g Sugar

B

65g Cold hard butter, cubed
C
70g Raisins
D
135g Whole milk
Zest of an orange (original use lemon, I use orange)
* Fresh Milk for brushing top, Sugar for sprinkle

Method:


1) Sieve self raising flour into a bowl, add sugar and mix well.
2) Add cold butter pieces, rub into flour mixture to resembles breadcrumbs.
3) Mix well with raisin.
4) Dig a well in the centre of above mixture, pour in D and mix to form a soft dough.
5) Remove and place on a floured table, roll dough out.
6) Cut into rounds with a 2" cutter and arrange them on a baking tray.
7) Brush the top with milk and sprinkle with some sugar.
8) Bake in pre-heated 200ºC oven for 15 – 18 mins till light brown.
9) Remove and served warm with fruit jam/honey or beaten fresh cream.