Try This Recipe: Currant and Cream Scones

I love to bake. I have no idea why, but when I'm feeling blue nothing cheers me up quite like the smell of the baking process, from yeast breads rising to quickbreads baking. I especially love some underappreciated home-baked goods, like sourdough and scones.

Sourdough is tricky, and has a bum rap as being too tempremental to try at home, which I think is patently untrue. The key is patience. I'm too proud to buy starter so I make it from scratch, with varied success - I've lost starter to a terrible cheese-fishy taste, but I also won Best in Show for my sourdough at the county fair. Patience.

Scones also have a bad reputation that they really haven't earned. For as much as I advocate playing with things in the kitchen, the chemistry of scones is something that shouldn't really be fooled around with, and I think that's where people run into trouble.

There are three keys to good scones. First, always use real cream. A low-fat scone is a sweetened rock. Yes, you add butter as well but trust me, fats are essential to a light, fluffy scone. The Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Baking says that quick breads contain more fat and sugar than yeast breads because fat and sugar "along with gentle and limited mixing, are what give quick breads their tender crumb." My mother the chemist agrees. "Think about what happens when you heat sugar; it gets hard. If you coat sugar with fat, it keeps the sugar from clumping together and forming that hard crystal." Fat molecules also repell one another, so they allow the leavening agent in your scone (in this case an acid-base reaction between the cream and the baking powder) to work to the best advantage.

Second, keep your butter cold. Cut it up before starting and then put it back in the fridge until you're ready to put it in - and once you do, work quickly. My mother and I have speculated (with no assistance offered by our baking books) and while we aren't sure why, this is an absolute truth of scone baking. Softened butter will not do. (My completely untested theory is that the cooled fats don't have a chance to make the dough softer and spread out, so the leavening can push your scone up and not out.)

And finally, even if you don't feel it, act with confidence. A scone is a quickbread because making it should be - you guessed it - quick. Overworking the dough can make it hard and dense, so don't overthink it. Once it looks pretty uniform, stop, and move on to the next step, do not pass Go, do not collect $200, do not see if "just a few more stirs" will make it any better. Trust me, it won't.

Last night I made currant and cream scones from the aforementioned baking book, and so far enough friends have asked for the recipe that I decided to share it. Williams-Sonoma, please don't sue me.

2 c flour
1/4 c sugar
1 T baking powder
1/2 t salt
2 t lemon zest
6 T unsalted butter cut into chunks
1/2 c dried currants
3/4 c heavy cream

Topping: excess cream, 1 T demerara or turbinado sugar, 1 t cinnamon

Stir together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and lemon zest. Cut in butter until the mixture forms large coarse crumbs the size of small peas. Stir in currants. Pour the cream over the dry ingredients and mix with until dry ingredients are moistened.

On a lightly floured surface, press the dough together until it clings in a ball. Shape into a disc about a half inch thick and 6 1/2 inches across. Cut the disc into 6 wedges and place on a baking sheet covered in parchment paper 1 inch apart.

Brush the wedges with the remaining cream. Mix the sugar and cinnamon, sprinkle over wedges. Bake at 425 until golden brown, 13-17 minutes. Cool on wire rack. Serve warm or store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to two days.