Sour Lemon Scones

This Sunday's recipe for sour lemon scones comes from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking as part of the Baked Sunday Mornings cookbook bake-along. I skipped the previous Baked Sunday Mornings recipe for a Cinnamon Mocha because I just couldn't get excited about drinking one, but I've really been looking forward to these sour lemon scones.

I love a good lemon scone. For years, a scone was my favorite breakfast, and an iced lemon poppyseed scone ranked as my absolute favorite. These sour lemon scones aren't as sweet as the iced lemon poppyseed scones you'll find in most bakeries and cafes, and that's a good thing.

I had every intention of candying my own lemon peel, but time and my lemons got away from me. This morning I looked at the two lemons remaining in my fridge and decided to skip the candied lemon peel since it was "optional". I think half a preserved lemon (rind only), candied ginger, or poppyseeds would work well in place of the candied peel, but for my first bake-through I wanted to see how lemon-y these scones were on their own.

Spoiler alert... not very.

These are really easy to make. I made a few modifications to the recipe, starting with halving it because I didn't need 12 scones for two of us.

Instead of adding the lemon peel to the buttermilk and egg, I grated the zest of 2 lemons into the granulated sugar first, rubbing the zest into the sugar until it was quite fragrant. I added the flour, baking powder, baking soda, Kosher salt, and powdered ginger to the lemon sugar, stirred everything together to mix it, then cut in a stick and a half of cold butter. "Cutting" the cold butter into the dry ingredients really doesn't take very long, just use your (clean) hands to rub the butter into the flour until the butter pieces are pea-sized.

I used about a tablespoon of lemon juice (from half a lemon), two tablespoons of 2% plain Greek yogurt, and enough skim milk to make up a ½ cup of dairy. I was trying to get a little extra lemon flavor into the scones while adding some extra body with the Greek yogurt since I don't usually keep buttermilk in my fridge. This sat together while I mixed the dry ingredients and butter. The sour lemon scone recipe calls for using only ¾ the amount of dairy in the batter itself, the rest of the buttermilk is meant to be brushed on top as the glaze. I added ¾ of my dairy to the dry ingredients (⅝ of a cup) along with ½ a beaten large egg (25g), but like I've found with every other scone recipe I've made from the Baked series of books, this was not enough dairy for the dough to come together. I added the rest (⅜ cup) of the dairy and my dough did eventually come together with some gentle kneading.

Caleb voted for round scones rather than the triangular form called for in the recipe. I patted out my dough to about 1-½ inches thick, then used a round 3-inch diameter biscuit cutter to cut out a total of seven scones from my half batch of sour lemon scone dough. [Note: I got 3 scones out of the dough rectangle the first time, I reshaped the dough into a cohesive block to get another 3 scones, and the final scone was just me smushing the remaining dough into something like a circle.]

Conveniently, I had half a beaten egg remaining, so I brushed that on top of my round scones as the glaze, followed with a sprinkling of turbinado sugar to add some crunch.

Given the shape change, I predicted my round scones probably wouldn't need as much time in the oven as the recipe calls for, and I was right. They took precisely 19.5 minutes to become golden brown along the edges and the top. I let them cool for a couple minutes (while I took some pictures), then served them warm.

These sour lemon scones from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking are delicious - light and tender, super flaky and butter, creamy without any actual cream - but as Caleb put it: "if you hadn't told me these were lemon scones, I never would have known there was any lemon in here." I guess I should have made that candied lemon peel after all. Missing lemon flavor notwithstanding, these scones are superb, easy to make, and would taste amazing with some clotted cream, marmalade, or as the shortcake base of a strawberry shortcake.

For the recipe and to read what the other bakers thought of these scones, head over the Baked Sunday Mornings.