Cream Scones with dried cherries and chocolate

I made a recent trip to California, where I had the most wonderful English tea experience:

My gigantic pot of tea and my finger sandwich spread with a side salad and one scone

Condiments for the scone: clotted cream, lemon curd, triple berry jam

Fully constructed scone heaven

So you can imagine that when I got home, I was itching to make some more scones to enjoy. The scone is one category of quick rise pastries that I have yet to get over my apprehension for making, and yet I collect scone recipes like it's my job. The recipes look simple and seem to be so tasty, and the sheer romance of having scones with freshly brewed tea makes me search avidly for recipes, and yet I shy away from making them. Partly I think it's the problem that I have not eaten many scones in my lifetime, and few of those were from reputable sources, so I lack confidence that I would be able to recognize home scone-making success in a recipe.

So this trip to CA and fateful lunch the fancy British style tea house gave me the confidence I needed to tackle the scone at home. I had sampled scone heaven! Light and fluffy on the inside, with a flaky and crisp crust. I happened to have some cream to use up from my ice cream escapades, so I started out with this cream scone recipe from Dorie Greenspan.

I added dark chocolate chips and dried cherries, which made lovely additions to these crumbly yet moist pastries. These scones are husband-approved!

Also, because they taste best on the day of baking, I froze down the shaped and sliced dough without baking so that I could bake fresh scones for a leisurely brunch or afternoon tea treat anytime I want to!

Cream Scones with dried cherries and chocolate chips (adapted from Baking: From my home to yours by Dorie Greenspan)

Ingredients:

1 large egg

2/3 cup cold heavy cream

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

5 tablespoons cold/frozen unsalted butter, cut into small pieces or grated with large holes on the box grater

3/4 cup of a combination of dried cherries and chocolate chips (the original recipe used dried currants)

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Place a rack in the center position. Prepare a baking sheet with parchment or a Silpat.

In a bowl, stir together the egg and cream.

In another bowl, sift and stir together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Throw in the cold butter pieces and use your fingers or a pastry cutter to quickly smush the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse sand with butter lumps about the size of peas and oats. Don't worry about leaving chunks of butter--you want that for maximum flakiness. Stir in the dried fruit and chocolate chips.

Pour the egg and cream over the flour mixture and toss the mixture together with a fork until it starts coming together as a lumpy, crumbly mass. At this point, use your hand or a rubber spatula and fold the dough over in the bowl 8-10 times. The dough will come together into a cohesive mass.

Dust a work surface with flour and turn the dough out on it. Divide the dough in half. With each half, pat the dough into a disk roughly 5 inches in diameter. Slice each disk into 6 wedges and transfer to baking sheet. If you want, you can freeze the dough at this stage by sticking the baking sheet into the freezer until the dough is solid, then store the wedges in an airtight container/bag.

Bake at 400 degrees for 20-22 minutes, when the tops/corners will be lightly brown. If baking from frozen dough, don't defrost and stick them straight into the preheated oven, adding a couple minutes to the baking time.

Cool 10 minutes before serving. With tea or coffee, of course.