Onion Scones

Photo: flickr user avlxyz

Ingredients

2/3 cup Flour Unbleached

1 teaspoon Baking Soda

2 teaspoons Cream Of Tartar

Salt To Taste

4 tablespoons Butter (½ Stick)

3/4 cup Milk

1 small chopped sweet onion

olive or canola oil or

Preparation

Onion Scones - Wilt 1 chopped smallish onion (Vidalia, for sweet flavor)

In a pan with a little olive oil or canola oil (healthy version) or bacon fat (traditional version) until transparent but not brown. Cool. Add most of it to the dough for Sweet Milk Scones before rolling it out, but for extra flavor reserve a bit of cooked onion to put on top of each scone

(after brushing scone with a beaten egg) before baking.

Preheat oven to 450F. Lightly grease a baking sheet and set aside. Sift together the flour, soda, cream of tartar and salt. Using a pastry blender or your hands, cut in the butter (or pulse in a food processor) until the mixture looks like coarse, grainy crumbs.

Pour the milk in a well in the center and mix until a soft elastic dough is formed. Knead the dough lightly on a floured surface until smooth. Roll or press the dough out until it is 3/4 inch thick. (If the dough is too thin the scone won't rise properly.)

Cut into 2 1/2 or 3-inch rounds with a cookie cutter or a glass and bake on prepared sheet for about 10 minutes or until they rise and are golden.

The book lists the yield as 8 scones, I usually get 10 or 12 using the full 3 cups of flour.

To make parsley and onion scones add about 2 Tablespoons dried minced onion and 1 or 2 Tablespoons dried parsley flakes with the dry ingredients. These amounts are VERY approximate, I used to measure but now I just dump in the onion flakes and parsley until it looks "right".

There are other variations listed in the with the recipe, if there is an interest I can post the variations listed for things like honey, jam, fruit etc.