Rapberry White Chocolate Scones

There's not much to say about these... The ingredients kind of speak for themselves...I mean raspberries and white chocolate in scone form...scones being my favorite-est member of the biscuit family...these couldn't possibly be bad.


Like most of my scone recipes, I first encountered the raspberry white chocolate combination at a coffee shop, which clearly means I spend waaaaay too much time in coffee shops, but the combination makes a lot of sense. White chocolate on its own is a bit too much sometimes (not for me though, I say bring on the chocolate!) but the subtle vanilla and cocoa butter flavour is beautifully accented and tempered by acidic ingredients like fruit.
So I made these pretty cream scones that are adapted from a betty crocker recipe. It is important to use frozen raspberries in this recipe as fresh would get crushed when you knead the dough, and then you might end up with pink scones which isnt a bad thing depending on your opinion on pink foods. You can use either white chocolate chips or chopped white chocolate, the latter will give you more bite, while i find the chips tend to melt too much and overcarmelize around the edges of the scones. The real secret ingredient in this recipe is the almond extract which somehow melds the flavour of the raspberries and white chocolate together seamlessly and adds a much greater depth to the scones.



Another thing to note is that this recipe makes a very soft tender scone, I tried to shape mine into hearts because everyone needs a little love by teatime... but they didn't really hold their shape. Instead, I would suggest shaping the entire thing into a disc and cutting wedges as the original recipe states, unless you're into deformed hearts, that's ok too.


Raspberry White Chocolate Scones

Dairy

Time: 20-30 minutes

Makes 8 scones

* 1-3/4 cups flour
* 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
* 2-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
* ½ teaspoon salt
* 1/3 cup cold butter
* 1 egg beaten
* ½ teaspoon almond extract
* ½ cup whipping cream
* ¾ cup frozen raspberries (do not thaw)
* 2/3 cup white chocolate chips or chunks
* extra cream for brushing
* extra granulated or coarse sugar for sprinkling

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. In a large bowl, mix flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Cut in butter, using pastry blender until mixture looks like fine crumbs. Stir in egg, almond extract, raspberries, white chocolate chips and whipping cream to create a ragged dough.
2. Pat dough into an 8-inch circle on baking sheet (or cut with a cookie cutter: one caveat though, the dough doesn’t hold it’s shape well) and lightly score into 8 wedges but do not separate wedges. Brush with additional cream, sprinkle with coarse sugar if desired.
3. Bake for 14-16 minutes or until light golden brown. Immediately remove from baking sheet; carefully separate wedges, serve warm.

From: Betty Crocker Baking for Today