1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 cup white sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup dried currants or raisins
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup sour cream
1 egg
1 tablespoon milk
Directions
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).
Sift the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt into a large bowl.
Cut in butter using a pastry blender or rubbing between your fingers until it is in pea sized lumps. Stir in the currants. Mix together 1/2 cup milk 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!
With floured hands, pat scone dough into balls 2 to 3 inches across, depending on what size you want.
Place onto a greased baking sheet, and flatten lightly. Let the scones barely touch each other. Whisk together the egg and 1 tablespoon of milk. Brush the tops of the scones with the egg wash. Let them rest for about 10 minutes.
Bake for 10 to 15 minutes in the preheated oven, until the tops are golden brown, not deep brown. Break each scone apart, or slice in half. Serve with butter, a selection of jams - or Fresh Lemon Curd (See Recipe Below).
Fresh Lemon Curd
(makes about 3 cups)
1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice (from about 5 lemons)
Zest of 2 lemons
3 large eggs
5 large egg yolks
1 3/4 cup sugar
5 tablespoons unsalted butter
There are two ways to make lemon curd, by putting a heatproof bowl over simmering water (indirect heat) or just in a pan on direct heat.
The second option, I would recommend to anyone who has had experience cooking custard based sauces (like creme anglaise)*.
Using a mixing bowl over the pan of simmering water is the safer method(to prevent your eggs from scrambling). Either way you choose, mix the eggs with the sugar, add the lemon juice and zest whisking to combine everything in a heatproof bowl. You want to stir with a rubber spatula continuously until it thickly coats the spatula or until you can see that it has thickly coated the side of the bowl. It should have the consistency of a thin pudding. Strain the curd into a clean bowl (to catch any small bits of cooked egg) and whisk in the butter. Cover with plastic wrap and cool. This mixture can be kept in the refrigerator for a few weeks.
*If cooking the mixture over direct heat, mix the ingredients into a thick bottomed pan and cook over very low heat, using a plastic spatula to stir, making sure to get all parts of the pan.
(E-mail Recipe)
Message Thread
« Back to index