Mastering secrets and Blueberry Thyme Scones

Fresh blueberries, thyme, lemon zest and juice—and two insider tips—create light, delicious scones. Recipe below.

BY NOW, PROBABLY EVERYONE HAS HEARD OF MASTERCLASS, where masters of their crafts in various fields teach online classes. The creative agency where I work gave us all MasterClass subscriptions so we could learn whatever caught our imaginations while we’re all stuck at home. But being a creative agency, we of course took it further. We’ve started doing our own master classes, with colleagues sharing their own special skills. These scones are a direct result of that.

Most of my colleagues cook and/or bake pretty well—adventurously, inquisitively, ambitiously. But to a person, when asked to name the best baker in the office, we’ll say Elizabeth. So when she offered a MasterClass on baking scones, we were all (virtually) there.

Before I share a couple of major scone-making tips I learned, let me just say what a charming way it was to start the work day. Looking at the now ubiquitous image grid of remote office meetings, but with many of my colleagues in their kitchens, ready to bake along with Elizabeth, stepping out of frame to grab a forgotten ingredient, measuring, stirring, looking up to catch the next step…

And Elizabeth’s baking and teaching us to bake were spot on. The assured moves born of much practice, explaining why to do things a certain way without overexplaining, and encouraging us to experiment with our add-ins. She also pointed out things that could go wrong and how to fix them. She instilled confidence, saying they’d probably be great whatever we did, and reminding us with a touch of humor also undoubtedly born of much practice, that if all failed, hey, it’s just a batch of scones—toss them and try again. And finally, like any good instructor, she acknowledged her teacher. Her scones are based on a recipe by Martha Stewart—but in reading it, I saw how she refined it, made it her own.

So, on to what I learned. We love scones here at Blue Kitchen. They’re a delicious, not overly sweet way to start a really good day. They’re versatile too—you can put all kinds of things in them to make them your own. And you can even make savory versions. We’ve made them a couple of times for the blog, usually making the slightly dense, sturdy pastries you often find.

Elizabeth’s scones were something different. Lighter, less dense, less chewy. The secret was using more cream—a lot more—than most recipes call for. Previous recipes I’d done call for 1/3 cup to 1/2 max. Elizabeth’s uses 3/4 cup. I was skeptical—my default mode for most things, I’ll admit—wondering if the dough would be too wet, too sticky. And the answer was a little sticky, especially when cutting the individual scones from the disk, but workable.

The other thing I learned was truly game changing for me. Elizabeth recommended making the dough, cutting the individual scones and then freezing them to bake later. You then pop them in the oven completely frozen—no thawing needed before you bake. First, this helps the end product stay more scone-shaped, not spreading out as the fresh dough can. And second, you can have as many or as few freshly baked scones whenever you want them.

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Blueberry Thyme Scones

Fresh blueberries, thyme, lemon zest and juice—and freezing the dough before baking—create light, delicious scones.

Course Breakfast, Dessert

Servings 8 scones (or 12—see Kitchen Notes)

Equipment

• parchment paper or Silpat 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
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup fresh blueberries
• 2 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves
• zest of 1 lemon plus 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 3/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon cold half & half (or cream—see Kitchen Notes)
• 1 large egg

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 powder and salt in a food processor. Pulse several times to thoroughly mix everything. Beat egg and half & half together in a bowl. Set aside.
• Add cubed butter to dry ingredients in food processor and pulse until the mix resembles a coarse meal, the bits of butter being 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 blueberries, thyme and lemon zest into the flour mix. Pour egg/half & half mixture over everything along with lemon juice and stir to combine.
• With flour-dusted hands, transfer mix onto a lightly floured surface. We use a silicone baking mat for the 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.