I always have homemade scones in my freezer ready to pop in the oven for a play date, a quick breakfast, or unexpected company. Scones are one of those things like biscuits and most cookies that do not suffer from being pre-refrigerated or frozen before baking. In fact, I feel in some ways they are better for it. The freezing helps them to better retain their shape while cooking instead of melting flat, which deprives you of that soft, delicate, chewy center.

I do both sweet and savory scones. These scones are sweet. A lot of people assume as soon as they hear 'rosemary' that they'll be savory. It is true that rosemary is typically used for savory dishes in this country, but in Italy I had a lot of fabulous rosemary infused desserts. My inspiration for this is an Italian rosemary pignoli dessert tart.

I have a standard recipe for sweet scones to which I add different flavorings. It is a little sweeter and lighter than a traditional scone, more cake-like in the center. At the end of the recipe I'll give you the variations to turn these scones into Blueberry Lemon scones and Chocolate Chip Grand Marnier scones which are some of my other favorites.


Standard Sweet Scone Recipe:

• 2/3 cup sugar
• 2 tsp kosher salt
• 4 cups All Purpose Flour
• 2 Tbsp Baking Powder
• 3 sticks (3/4 pound) unsalted butter
• 4 eggs, room temperature
• 1 cup (8 oz) heavy cream, plus 3 Tbsp for topping
• 1/4 cup coarse sugar (Sugar in the Raw, Turbinado sugar) for topping

Flavorings:

• 3 Tbsp fresh rosemary leaves, finely chopped
• 3 Tbsp Limoncello
• 1 cup lightly toasted pignoli (pine nuts)

Cut the butter into 1/2 inch chunks and place in the freezer to chill. You want it to be very cold before mixing. Combine sugar, salt, flour, and baking powder in the bowl of a stand mixer with a paddle attachment. You can also do this by hand or with a fork and a bowl if you do not have a stand mixer.

Add the chilled butter and process until the butter is in pieces approximately the size of peas. You want there to be visible chunks of butter in the mix. Mix 1 cup heavy cream and the four eggs and beat lightly. Add this mix to the flour mix and process until just combined. DO NOT OVERMIX. At this point, remove the bowl from the machine, add the flavorings and gently incorporate by hand with a spatula. Turn out the dough onto a gently floured surface and flatten out to approximately 1 inch thick.

Now you can cut out the scones at this point with a cookie or biscuit cutter, but I like to be a bit more efficient with my dough. You do not want to re-knead the scraps left behind from that method because they'll be tougher than the first scones, so you typically end up discarding the scraps. In order not to waste any dough, I transfer my dough into a plastic-wrap lined quarter rimmed sheet pan (see picture).
 


I gently flatten out the dough in the pan, cover with the overlapping plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least an hour so that it is firm and easy to cut.

Once chilled, I unwrap the dough and transfer to a large, lightly floured cutting board. I score it into 24 sections (6 x 4) and then cut with a floured knife. I then cut each square down the diagonal, making 48 mini triangular scones.

 

Brush the top of the scones with the reserved 3 Tbsp heavy cream and sprinkle with the coarse sugar. Or better yet, let your little helpers do it.




At this point the scones are ready to go in a 400 degree oven for approximately 8-10 minutes, or until golden brown.  I prefer to freeze them at this point, uncovered and in a single layer. Once frozen solid (4-6 hours) transfer to a Ziploc bag or vacuum seal. They will keep for months. Add 3-4 minutes to the cooking time for frozen scones.

The scones right before baking: