I have been absolutely terrible at updating my website––as in, the last time I touched it, Ash Princess wasn’t even up for preorder! How far we’ve come: all three books in the series are now out, I’ve got two new projects coming out next year (one YA, one adult. For more information, check out the Books page), and in case you haven’t seen me shouting about it on Twitter and Instagram: I’m moving to London in just over 2 weeks!
I’m going to be better about updating here, and I’ve also gotten a lot of requests to have my recipes in a more easily accessible place instead of just sharing them on my instagram stories. To start, here is my absolute BEST scone recipe (British style, studded with diced crystalized ginger). They aren’t too sweet, and pair perfectly with a smear of apple butter or orange marmalade. Ideal with a little clotted cream, but sadly for those of us State-side, that can be tricky to find.
Crystalized Ginger Cream Scones
(Adapted from Cook’s Illustrated)
Makes 8 scones
Ingredients:
- 250g (2 cups) all-purpose flour
- 1 tbsp baking powder
- 37g (3 tbsp) granulated sugar
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 70g (5 tbsp) unsalted butter (cultured or European-style if you can get it!), cold and cut into small cubes
- 1/2 cup chopped crystalized ginger
- 231g (1 cup) heavy cream
- Preheat the oven to 425º
2. Mix flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt in large bowl or the bowl of food processor fitted with steel blade. (The food processor is a great tool to have here, but you can do it by hand if you want, it’ll just be a bit of a workout!)
3. Add the cubed butter to the food processor and pulse until the mixture looks like wet sand, though it’s okay if there are some larger pieces of butter intact. If doing this by hand, use your fingers or a pastry blender to get the dough to the wet sand consistency. Add the ginger and mix a little more, though you don’t want to break the pieces up too much, so be careful if using a food processor––one or two pulses should do it.
4. Use a rubber spatula to fold in the heavy cream until a dough forms.
5. Tip the dough (along with all those dry, floury bits on the bottom of the bowl) to a lightly floured work surface and knead just enough to get it into a solid, slightly sticky ball. From here, you can break the dough ball into 8 similarly sized balls and flatten each one into a thick disk (like a biscuit). Alternatively, flatten the large dough ball into a large disk and cut it into 8 wedges, like you’re cutting a pizza.
6. Place the scones on an ungreased baking sheet (or a baking mat for less mess) and bake for 12-15 minutes. Let cool at least 10 minutes before serving.