Princess scones

Because they're pink, of course

Cranberry scones
2 cups unbleached wheat or whole wheat flour
1 cup oats, ground
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 T brown sugar (optional, for sweeter scone)
½ teaspoon salt
¾ stick (6 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, cut into bits (or grate frozen butter. Make sure the grater is also frozen)
1/2 cup dried cranberries, plumped

3 T honey
1 large egg
1 cup cranberry jelly
1/3 cup plain yogurt or sour cream

Preheat oven to 400F (375 if you have a baking stone in your oven) and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Adjust a baking rack to the middle position.

Plump the cranberries by placing in a cup of water and microwaving on high about 5 minutes. Drain and set aside. Beat together the liquid ingredients and set aside. Mix the dry ingredients, then cut in the butter with a pastry cutter, knife or your hands until it resembles a coarse meal. Stir the cranberries into the flour mixture. Add the liquid mixture to the flour mixture. Stir until just combined. Dough will be very sticky.

For drop scones, place in tablespoon scoops onto a parchment-covered baking sheet about 1 inch apart on and bake for 18 to 20 minutes, or until pale golden-pink. Transfer the scones to a cooling rack and let them cool slightly before serving.

Never throw anything away

The ice rink where I work has the most wonderful concessionaire. A skating mom herself, she transformed the concession stand from garbage-central to an honest-to-goodness healthy cafe; she makes everything from espresso brownies to salmon burgers with a hot plate, panini grill, and toaster oven.

Like all fast-food stands, she's got "meal deals," but hers are a sandwich, Italian soda (your choice of flavors), a homemade cookie, and a piece of fruit. Last week I grabbed a banana which I never ate. By the time I remembered it, it was, well let's call it "overripe."

Did I mention never throw anything away? I roasted the apple peels (from the home made applesauce), some garlic cloves, and the last of the summer's tomatoes in a 300F oven for 60 minutes, then simmered it all in apple cider for 30 minutes. Run through a food mill, then smooth with an immersible blender. Tomato-apple soup. Recipe on Mahlzeit.

Apple banana scones

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour (for October unprocessed, use all unbleached wheat flour)
1 cup unbleached wheat or whole wheat flour
½ cup oats
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
2 T cane sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
¾ stick (6 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, cut into bits (or grate frozen butter. Make sure the grater is also frozen)
¾ cup walnuts, crushed

3T light corn syrup
1 large egg plus one egg yolk
1 overripe banana, mashed
2/3 cup apple sauce
1/3 cup plain yogurt or sour cream

Preheat oven to 400F (375 if you have a baking stone in your oven) and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Adjust a baking rack to the middle position.

Beat together the liquid ingredients and set aside. You can leave out the corn syrup; your scones will just be a little less sweet. If you leave it out, replace the liquid (more apple sauce or sour cream works fine).

Mix the dry ingredients, then cut in the butter with a pastry cutter, knife or your hands until it resembles a coarse meal. Stir the nuts into the flour mixture. Add the liquid mixture to the flour mixture. Stir until just combined. Dough will be very sticky.

For drop scones, place in tablespoon scoops onto a parchment-covered baking sheet about 1 inch apart on and bake for 15 to 17 minutes, or until pale golden. Transfer the scones to a cooling rack and let them cool slightly before serving.

Cousin Chrissie Scones

I sat down this morning to come up with a scone recipe, as I always do, by opening the computer to one of the basic recipes, which I then adapt. Of course, I had to open up Facebook as well, and in a couple of minutes, had "Chris" chatting.

At first I thought it was my friend and co-worker Chris, but then I realized it was my cousin Chrissie, whom I last saw when we were 14, 40 years ago. We were able to catch up over a nearly hour-long chat. A couple of times, I was close to tears knowing that this person, with whom I share both so much and so little, also wanted to reawaken the connection.

I've found many of my literally long-lost cousins on Facebook; when people complain about how stupid and lame Facebook is, I just think how off-base they are. Facebook is an amazing resource. Because of Facebook you never need to be estranged, or cut off, or lost to your far-flung family or friends ever again. I know that there are people we'd all just as soon never heard of us, let alone found us again. But there are lots of people that just slip away, through neglect or inattention. They're out there, just waiting to be found.

I made these while chatting:

Blueberry Scones

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
½ cup oats
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
¾ stick (6 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, cut into bits

½ cup fresh blueberries
½ cup honey
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1/2 cup sour cream

1 cup blueberries (works best if they're frozen first)

Preheat oven to 400F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Adjust a baking rack to the middle position. In a food processor, mix the fresh blueberries, honey, eggs, and sour cream.

Mix the dry ingredients, then cut in the butter with a pastry cutter, knife or your hands until it resembles a coarse meal. Stir the frozen blueberries into the flour mixture. Add the liquid mixture to the flour mixture. Stir until just combined. Dough will be quite sticky (these are drop scones).

Using a soup spoon, drop scones onto a parchment-covered baking sheet about 1 inch apart on and bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until pale golden. Transfer the scones to a cooling rack and let them cool slightly before serving.

I hoped they'd be blue, but no such luck.

Happy Fourth of July

Sconeday lands on the holiday this week, with special red-white-and-blue scones. I'm having a great holiday weekend-- the Peterson Garden Re-dedication yesterday was a fantastic party with kids and dogs (and chickens) in costume (you heard me). We had garden tours, singalongs, family, friends and great food.

I'm sitting here waiting for my good friend and her rabbit-scaring dog. They drop by periodically to convince my resident evil furface that my perennial bed is NOT a good place to set up housekeeping (or for forays into the bean patch, where said furface has decimated the crop).

Later today I'm marching in the Evanston Fourth of July Parade with our skating camp, and tomorrow Peterson Garden powwow with these fantastic scones:


Red-White-and-Blue scones
Recipe: Cooks Illustrated scones recipe (gonna make you sign up for the site)

After rolling out the scones in about a 12" square, lay blueberries on one-third, then raspberries or cut-up strawberries and the next third, finally, break up a frozen white chocolate bar or use white chocolate chips (mine was a Divine Chocolates white chocolate with strawberries from Ten Thousand Villages) and lay that on the final third.

Continue recipe as directed.

What spice?

I put out a call on Twitter for a spice or herb to use with raspberries. Here are all the suggestions:

From gardenfaerie- cinnamon
From annmjenson- jalapeno or curry
from xitomal- mint or anise
NoraChin likes they idea of mint as well
impstrump wants Raspberry-cannabis, which I think has definite possibilities. She also suggested Echinacea, which has the advantage of also preventing colds, I guess.
DaggerBytesBack wants cayenne
Icemom says cardamom and also white chocolate (which isn't technically a spice...) and also sent me the Cooks Illustrated recipe, which I used (see below).
OpenlyBalanced suggests ginger

Clearly, I have a lot of scones to make. I ended up making plain Raspberry scones with jalapeno jelly (from Trader Joe's, but here's a nice recipe).

And here I am going to depart from the recipes. I used Diane's suggestion and made the recipe from America's Test Kitchen/Cooks Illustrated, which is probably the best, if the most annoyingly complex, scone recipe I ever made (frozen, grated butter. Ever grate butter? Yeah, butter EVERYwhere.) But the scones are indescribable- flaky and sweet without being crumbly or cloying. (Okay, I guess not indescribable, since I just described them.)

Because America's Test Kitchen is probably my favorite show and I want to marry (and eat with) everyone on it, I'm putting here, in lieu of the recipe, the link to sign up for the site. Yes, recipes on the web that you have to pay for. But if you like to cook, you should susbcribe to this site anyway. (My kickback check will be in the mail, soon, yes?)

Last March I committed my self (and my long-suffering family) to slow food- seasonal, local, organic, whole. Once we got past the early difficulties-- finding local sources, how to stock a larder when you can't just run to the store, etc.-- we've found it a revelation.

I was famous when my kids were growing up for never having food in the house. I refused to stock up on junk food. Junk food, when we purchased it, was purchased for immediate consumption only; I never had bags of chips just lying around.

The problem was, because I wasn't thinking past "no junk food," there wasn't anything else lying around either.

What we've found since committing to this way of eating is that there is ALWAYS food. Because I don't mind them chowing down on real popcorn, or homemade crackers, cookies or scones, because the homemade bread is so delicious, there always seems to be something to eat now.

One of the things we've given up along the way is cold cereal. I never liked it at all, and no one is that crazy about granola, so I've replaced cereal with weekly scones. I've made some delicious ones, and in nearly 4 months of scone baking have yet to repeat one. They were taking over my other recipe blog.

This seasonal scone can be made with any fruit (last week I made them with rhubarb; next week the raspberries should be ripe), and you can substitute oats or whole wheat flour for the cornmeal (play with the texture when substituting). This is a drop scone; leave out the egg yolk and increase the grain for a denser, cut scone.

Strawberry Cornbread Scones

2 cups all-purpose flour
2/3 cup cornmeal
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon table salt
3/4 stick (6 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, cut into bits
1 1/2 cups diced strawberries (¼-inch cubes), macerated in sugar (abt 3 T)

1/4 cup honey
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup milk

Preheat oven to 400F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Adjust a baking rack to the middle position. In a small bowl, mix the strawberries with 3 tablespoons sugar.

Mix the dry ingredients, then cut in the butter with a pastry cutter, knife or your hands until it resembles a coarse meal. Stir the fruit into the flour mixture. Lightly beat the honey, egg, yolk, milk and sourcream together in a bowl (use the same one you used for the strawberries ), then add this mixture to the flour mixture. Stir until just combined. Dough will be very sticky.

Using soup spoons (for large scones) or teaspoons (for small scones) spoon out 1 1/2" or 2" mounds onto the cookie sheet, about 1 inch apart. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until pale golden. Transfer the scones to a cooling rack and let them cool slightly before serving.

Apple maple scones

3/4 cup all-purpose flour plus 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup corn meal
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons orange zest
1/2 cup cold butter, cut into small pieces

1 large egg
1/3 cup sourcream
1-2 tablespoon milk
1/4 c maple syrup
1 teaspoon maple extract (or vanilla; maple is hard to find)

1 1/2 cups diced apples
½ cup golden raisins, plumped

Preheat oven to 425°.

Mix together first 5 ingredients. Cut in cold butter until mixture resembles coarse meal, then mix in fruit until blended until blended. Whisk together egg and liquid ingredients in a separate bowl; add to flour mixture, and mix just until blended. Dough will be sticky.

Spoon in large tablespoonsful onto a lightly greased baking sheet (or line a sheet with parchment paper). Bake at 425° for 15 minutes or until golden.

One day a week

I've been getting on my soapbox a lot lately, because I lost a lot of weight recently, and people are noticing. They ask me how I did it, and my response is "by eating."

You heard that right, I lost weight by eating. I never set out to lose weight, and didn't care that much, as I wasn't terribly overweight for someone of my age (BMI 29, now down to 25). But in March, I started eating SLOW- seasonal, local, organic, whole. I actually increased the percentage of animal fat in my diet, without increasing the amount of animal products I eat. So- whole milk and whole milk products, grass-fed beef, sustainably farmed chicken, with !gasp! the skin on. I stopped buying food with ingredients, and have been making my own everything: crackers, salad dressing, bread, jam, mayonnaise, you name it.

I have not been eating any less. By eating SLOW and other efforts (walking a lot more, expanding my garden) I reduced my family's carbon footprint by an entire planet.

And when I tell people this story, the responses are predictable-- too expensive, don't have time, don't know how to cook, my kids won't eat like that (why, do they have an independent income for their own food?) and on and on.

So here is MY challenge-- change your eating one day a week.

Just one day.

Do you eat out all the time? Start cooking from scratch one day. I'll let you buy pasta, but make your own tomato sauce, and buy your lettuce in a head instead of a bag. Use oil and vinegar instead of additive-rich purchased dressing. Just for one day a week.

Do you already cook from scratch one day a week? Pick another day, and eat only seasonal, whole foods that day. I'll let you go to Whole Foods (if you must) or another aware market, and buy strawberry preserves in March, as long as they're organic. I'll let you buy pasta, but read the label and make sure it says "semolina flour, water" and nothing else.

Already doing that too? Make bread. Or jam. Or crackers (they're ridiculously easy, look for my recipe on this blog). Roast a chicken. Don't worry how it turns out the first couple of times, you're only doing this once a week, remember? Do you bake a lot? One day, don't use the mixer-save the electricity and do it by hand.

How often do you go to the grocery store? One day a week, right? Go to the local, organic market instead, or the nearest farmers' market, or Whole Foods if you must. Too expensive? It's only one day a week!

Are you like me, and way into this already? You can change yourself, and your family, and your planet one day a week as well. Eat vegetarian one day a week. Already doing that? Eat vegan one day a week (that's where I've gotten). Already doing that? Eat raw one day a week.

If you've taken your food as far as you're comfortable, then take your one day a week and walk everywhere. Use it to donate time to a community or school garden, or a political action group. Grow a tomato plant- that's way less effort than one day a week, and then use your day at harvest time to preserve the bounty. Use your day to write your elected officials and demand recycling, the end of Big Ag subsidies and work arounds, and fair rules for small family farms.

I believe it. I lost 25 pounds with literally no effort toward that goal. We can save the planet, folks. What will you do one day a week?

And yes, I know it's sconeday, one day a week. Here you go:

Rhubarb Cream Scones
(adapted from The Way the Cookie Crumbles, who adapted it from Gourmet via Smitten Kitchen)

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
½ cup oats
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
¾ stick (6 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, cut into bits
2 cups diced rhubarb (¼-inch cubes), about 3 stalks, macerated in sugar (abt 3 T)
½ cup honey
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1/2 cup sour cream + 1/2 cup milk, whisked

Preheat oven to 400F and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Adjust a baking rack to the middle position. In a small bowl, mix the rhubarb with 3 tablespoons sugar.

Mix the dry ingredients, then cut in the butter with a pastry cutter, knife or your hands until it resembles a coarse meal. Stir the rhubarb into the flour mixture. Lightly beat the honey, egg, yolk, and milk/sourcream together in a bowl (use the same one you used for the rhubarb), then add this mixture to the flour mixture. Stir until just combined.

On a well-floured surface with floured hands, pat the dough into a 1-inch-thick round (about 8 inches in diameter). Using a 2-inch round cutter or rim of a glass dipped in flour, cut out as many rounds as possible, rerolling scraps as necessary. Arrange rounds about 1 inch apart on baking sheet and bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until pale golden. Transfer the scones to a cooling rack and let them cool slightly before serving.

Sconeday experiment

Or, Trust Your Instincts, But Read The Recipe

On the last day that my daughter was home, I decided to have warm scones ready for her when she got up. I had the idea in the back of my head to try the apricot compote-for-honey substitution with scones, so I was pretty excited about these. I'm really a novice baker. I'm a complete ease around a stove top and a frying pan, and I can make a stew with my eyes closed. But baking scares me, and I tend to stick to the recipe closely.

Except of course, that's hard to do when you don't read the recipe.

"I can do these without looking up the recipe," sez I to myself sez I. "I've been making scones once a week for months now."

The dough looked lovely-- a gentle orange color-- and smelled divine. It was kinda stiff, I almost rolled it, but thought, no I like the rough "drop" scones. Just before sticking them in the oven, I glanced at the recipe and realized, oops.

Forgot the butter.

Yes folks, I forgot to put the butter in the scones. Too late to do it right now, the dough was all mixed. So how do I get butter evenly mixed through a dense dough filled with nuts.

I melted it folks. Kneaded it in, and reformed the scones. They're going in the oven now; I'll be back in 15 minutes to tell you how they are. In the meantime, here's a lovely picture from my garden.
Well, they're a little gummy, but they taste delicious! So the conclusion is, you can screw up a baking recipe, but I don't recommend it.

Apricot-walnut scones
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
2 Tbs cane sugar (or 1 Tbs packed brown sugar)
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 Tbs dried or fresh orange zest

5 tablespoons unsalted butter

2/3 cup fresh orange juice, with zest
1/4 cup apricot compote
1/4 cup sour cream, or plain or vanilla yogurt

1/2 cup dried apricots, diced and plumped or 1/4 cup crushed walnuts

Heat oven to 425F/218C

Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt into a large bowl. Cut in butter (NOTE: DO NOT FORGET THIS STEP) using a pastry blender or by rubbing between your fingers until it has the consistency of corn meal. Whisk together honey, apricots, and sour cream in a measuring cup. Pour all at once into the dry ingredients, and stir gently until well blended. (Overworking the dough results in terrible scones!)

To prepare the dried apricots, plump them by boiling them for about a minute on stove top or microwave. Drain and pat dry, mix into the scone batter.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and drop batter by generous spoonfuls. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes in the preheated oven, until the tops are golden brown, not deep brown.