Lemon Cranberry Scones

This recipe is RETARDED delicious.

Here's what you need to know:

Ingredients:

• 1/2 c heavy cream (plus additional for brushing the scones)
• 3 tbsp sugar (plus additional for dusting the scones)
• 1 tsp lemon extract
• 1 large egg
• 2 1/4 c all-purpose flour
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 6 tbsp (3/4 stick) cold unsalted butter (cut into bits)
• 1/2 c dried cranberries

1.  Preheat the oven to 400.

2.  Mix the heavy cream, lemon extract, egg, and sugar (see pyrex bowl).

3. Mix the flour, salt, and baking powder (see blue bowl).

4.  This part is rather pleasant.  Dump your butter bits into the flour mix and use your hands to squeeze the butter into the dry mix as well as you can.  Lots of squishing.  Do a good job.

5. Stir the cranberries into the dry mix.  Then dump the wet mix into the dry mix and stir with a fork until it forms a wet dough.  I used one of those big plastic bacon forks, because I don't listen to anyone, especially myself.

6. Knead the dough by hand for less than 30 seconds- you really just want to make sure it's all mixed.  You can then separate the dough into 8 big scones or 16 mini-scones.  Some people roll the dough out with a rolling pin and then use circle-cutters, but I am not that fancy.  I just separate the clumps by hand and then flatten them to about 1/2" high with my fingertips.  And hey- one less thing to clean.  I went with 16 since I didn't know any better.

7. Brush the scones with a bit of heavy cream, and then sprinkle them with sugar.  A pastry brush would be ideal.  I didn't have one, so I kind of dribbled cream over the top and then sprinkled the sugar by spoon.  It was pretty ghetto.  I bought myself a brush the next day.

8.  Cook for 15-18 minutes, or until the edges look a little browned.

9. ENJOY AND GLOAT.

So..... yes.  Freaking delicious.  They are good warm (with milk!), but I actually liked them best the next day- at room temperature and with coffee.

I ended up making 3 batches over 3-4 days.  After the initial mini-scones, I went with 8 big ones.  Mainly because it only used one pan.  =)

I actually had a pastry brush this time.  What a difference.  HA- look at my bread rising in the background- what an industrious week I was having!

The nice thing about scones is that you can throw in whatever you want to change it up.  Tonight, I needed some comfort sweets in a bad way.  It was a long day with an angry toddler.  I wasn't feeling the lemon, so I....

• Used dark brown sugar instead of white
• Used 1 tbsp of pure maple syrup instead of lemon extract
• Used golden raisins instead of cranberries
• Sprinkled the scones with cinnamon and white sugar

HOLY CRAP.  DELICIOUS.  I had to cut us off after 2 each.  We'll eat the rest tomorrow.  I like them for breakfast.  Such a nice way to start the day.  Also, notice my new Nordic baking sheet and my new sil-pat.  =)  But I only bought one- they are a bit pricey.  I will say that they are flippin' awesome, though.  And it's delightful to have a baking sheet that doesn't "gong!" while in the oven.  /happy sigh