Light, airy and not too sweet: Lemon Lavender Scones

These lemony treats are perfect for breakfast, a snack with coffee or tea, or just because. Recipe below.

PUT ME IN A NEIGHBORHOOD BAKERY OR COFFEE SHOP and you can be pretty sure I’ll be looking for scones. And the scones that hit the sweet spot for me are the not-too-sweet ones. No chocolate chunks or sugary glaze, thank you. Just a tiny bit of sweetness, maybe some fruit and/or nuts (or not), and maybe an herb thing going on. Like these Lemon Lavender Scones.

They are light, lemony and airy, the slightly crisp exterior giving way to a finely crumbed interior. The lavender is a subtle touch, just adding another nice layer. They’re what a scone should be. A breakfast treat. An afternoon snack with some coffee or tea. Or something to be enjoyed leaning against the kitchen counter, smiling smugly and thinking, “I made this.”

We go through a lot of lemon juice here. But for these scones, we used a combination of lemon zest and pure lemon extract. Lemon juice is acid-based and can be tart. Lemon extract is made from soaking lemon peel in alcohol; it delivers a strong lemon flavor without the tartness. It’s also concentrated—a half teaspoon of lemon extract equals one tablespoon of lemon juice. When you’re mixing dry and wet ingredients to create a dough, lemon extract lets you use less liquid. And finally, because it’s not acid-based, there’s no worry that it will curdle the half & half or cream.

Culinary lavender is a versatile cooking herb, great both in sweet and savory dishes, particularly lamb. If you grow fresh lavender, you can use the flower buds to cook with. But make sure it is culinary lavender; it is often called English or “true” lavender and is much milder in flavor. Non-culinary lavender is much stronger and can add a pine or even soapy flavor. Or you can buy dry culinary lavender flower buds. We like the ones we get from Spice House (no, this isn’t a paid product placement—we shop there). As a bonus, their flat packs ship free. A little lavender goes a long way, though. Use a light hand or it will take over.

A little pro tip. Freeze prepared scones before baking them. Later, you can pop as many as you want—still frozen—in the oven. In 20 minutes or so, you’re having freshly baked homemade scones.

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Lemon Lavender Scones

Freezing these scones before baking helps make them airier—and lets you bake them as you need them.

Servings 8 scones (or 12—see Kitchen Notes)

Equipment

• parchment paper or silicone baking mat

Ingredients

• 6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) cold unsalted butter
• 2 cups all-purpose flour plus more for work surface
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar plus more for sprinkling
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1-1/2 teaspoons dried culinary lavender (or fresh—see Kitchen Notes)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• zest of 1 lemon, a generous tablespoon (use more than 1 lemon, if needed)
• 3/4 cup cold half & half, plus 1 tablespoon and more as needed (or cream—see Kitchen Notes)
• 1 large egg
• 1 teaspoon pure lemon extract (see Kitchen Notes to substitute fresh lemon juice)

Instructions

• Cut butter into 1/2-inch cubes: halve the stick lengthwise, rotate it 90º and slice lengthwise again, then slice crosswise into 1/2-inch pieces. Place in a bowl and pop in the freezer while you prepare the dry ingredients (you want the butter to stay as cold as possible until you're actually baking the scones).
• Combine flour, sugar, baking soda, salt and dried lavender in a food processor. Pulse several times to thoroughly mix everything. Beat egg and 3/4 cup half & half together in a bowl, then stir in the lemon extract. Set aside.
• Add cubed butter to dry ingredients in food processor and pulse until the mix resembles a coarse meal, with bits of butter pea-sized or smaller.
• Transfer flour mix to a mixing bowl. Check with your hands for errant pieces of butter that are too large and break them up with your fingers.
• Stir the lemon zest into the flour mix. Pour egg/half & half/lemon extract mixture over everything and stir to combine. If it happens to not be coming together, add a little more half & half, a tablespoon at a time. But be cautious; the dough can be quite sticky.
• With flour-dusted hands, transfer mix onto a lightly floured surface. Working quickly, shape it into an 8-inch disk, about 1 inch thick, slightly mounded in the center. Again, it can be sticky; dust your hands with more flour or even sprinkle a little over the dough as needed.
• Don’t skip this step. Place the dough disk on its silicone baking mat on a hotel pan and pop it in the freezer for 20 to 30 minutes. This will make the notoriously sticky dough much easier to cut into wedges and handle.
• Using a sharp knife, cut into 8 wedges.
• At this point, we highly recommend freezing the scones to bake later. This helps the end product stay more scone-shaped, not spreading out as the fresh dough can. Also, you can bake fewer scones at a time. There’s not suddenly two of you staring down eight scones. And if you wake up on a random Tuesday morning thinking a scone would start the day just right, you’re that much closer. Transfer the individual scones to a parchment- or silicone baking mat-lined hotel tray pan. Cover with waxed paper and freeze for at least two hours. Then store scones in zippered plastic bags; we do them in sets of two.
• Do not thaw scones to bake. Preheat oven to 400ºF and place scones on a lined baking sheet. Brush tops with a little half & half, and sprinkle with sugar, if desired. Bake until golden, 18 – 20 minutes, rotating sheet halfway through. Watch closely toward the end so they don’t brown too much.
• Transfer baked scones to a wire cooling rack and cool either slightly or completely, depending on your will power.
• You can also bake all or some of the scones right now. If you plan to do this, preheat the oven while the disk is still in the freezer and follow the baking instructions above, but check them at 16 minutes to be on the safe side.

Kitchen Notes

Turn eight into a dozen. Lately, we've been downsizing our scones and making more per batch. Divide the mixed dough into two smaller disks. Freeze them briefly, then slice into six small wedges each. Follow the rest of the regular recipe, but bake for a slightly shorter time—about 16 minutes. And to be clear, the minis are not one or two bites; they're decent sized pastries.

Half & half or cream? We use half & half because that’s what we typically have on hand. Either will work.

Got fresh lavender? Use about a tablespoon of the buds or flowers, stirring them into the flour mixture when you add the zest.

Lemon juice instead of extract? Use only 1/2 cup of half & half, and stir the half & half into the mixture before stirring in 2 tablespoons of lemon juice. If the dough is too dry, add in a little more half & half, a tablespoon at a time.

Liz’s Crockery Corner. This plate is a poser. We're not sure about anything with this plate except that it is a plate. It’s an example of the pottery style called Gaudy Welsh. Or maybe it isn’t—while this has the casual, almost dashed-off style and the Imari-inspired cobalt blue and orange that characterize most Gaudy Welsh, it is also decorated with gold, which some collectors feel makes it… something, but not Gaudy Welsh. Also, this plate has absolutely no marks on the back at all. So it could be something made in England, so early that marks were not legally required; or it could be something made in America, possibly any time after say 1840, and left unmarked to trick buyers who favored British ceramics over US-made. Another puzzle is that the ceramic is quite high quality, with the whiteness and translucency of bone china. Over here at Liz’s Crockery Corner, we have no idea what to call this plate or where it came from or who might have made it, but we also do not care because we love it so much.