Thursday, April 28, 2011

Lemon Blueberry and Ricotta Scones with Lemon Curd



This is in no way inspired by the royal wedding hooplah whatsoever.

It's totally normal to think about making scones for the first time in years on a random Thursday night so you'll have them for breakfast on a random Friday morning with or without a cup of tea or Pimms.

Right?  Right.  No matter, these are fantastic and look gorgeous.  And lemon curd?  Not nearly as hard as I would have thought.  Only five minutes of stove-tending creates a deliciously tart scone topping that would go great with some clotted cream if, for whatever reason, you do decide to go all out for a random Friday morning celebration.



Lemon, Blueberry, and Ricotta Scones
Adapted from my favorite on Allrecipes.com


Makes 16 small scones
Total time: 35-45 minutes (Active time 15-20 minutes)

  • 2 cups (250g) all-purpose flour
  • 1/3 cup (75g) sugar
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • zest of one lemon (two teaspoons)
  • 1/2 cup (115g) unsalted butter, frozen
  • 1/2 cup (75g) fresh or frozen blueberries
  • 2/3 cup (160g) fresh ricotta
  • 1 egg

Preheat oven to 400F/200C.  Mix flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and lemon zest in a large bowl.  Grate butter on the large holes of a box grater and work in with your hands (or to make this step immensely easier, cut the frozen butter into chunks and combine with dry ingredients with a food processor).  Mix in blueberries.

In a small bowl, mix ricotta and egg until smooth and add to the rest of the ingredients in the large bowl.  Stir until large dough clumps form.  When most of the dough has clumped, turn it out on a floured surface and work into one large ball.  Pat into an evenish rectangle about 3/4" thick.  Cut into 8 smaller rectangles, then cut each on the diagonal to form 16 triangles and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon sugar.

Transfer triangles to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and place about 1" apart.  Bake 10-15 minutes until golden.



Lemon Curd
Adapted from Baking Bites


Makes ~1/2 cup
Total time: 10 minutes (Active time 5-6 minutes)

  • juice of two lemons (about 1/3 cup/80mL)
  • zest of one lemon (about 2 teaspoons)
  • 1/3 cup (75g) sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tablespoon unsalted butter 

In a small sauce pan, combine sugar, lemon juice, and zest over medium heat.  Remove from heat once the sugar is dissolved.

Beat the egg in a medium bowl and add the lemon-sugar syrup in a slow drizzle (this should take at least a minute or two), whisking constantly until well combined.

Pour back in the saucepan and add the butter.  Cook over low heat until the curd is thick (about 5 minutes), stirring constantly.  Store in an airtight container in the fridge when cool.

2 comments:

  1. Oh my, the blogging world has become obsessed with lemon curd lately! I need to get on it!!

    ReplyDelete