Since I bought lavender last year, I've used it exactly once. So, as you can imagine, I really wanted to try the recipe for Sweet Lavender Scones when I came across it. I decided to make the scones this morning.
This was an easy recipe to make, but it does yield a lot of scones (16). Mix together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt (I used ½ teaspoon table salt), sugar, and lavender. Cut in butter (I used margarine) with a pastry cutter (affiliate link). Add lemon zest, buttermilk (or sour milk), and vanilla. Turn dough out onto a floured surface and knead dough (fold dough in on itself) 5 times.
The recipe says to shape the scones by patting the dough into a rectangle, then cutting it into 8 squares, and cutting each square into a triangle. This worked okay for me, although I can't cut evenly and ended up with a couple of small scones. You could also divide the dough in half, pat each half into a circle, and cut each circle into 8 wedges.
I brushed my scones with milk, sprinkled with sugar, and crowded them all onto one Silpat-lined baking sheet rather than the two that the recipe recommended. I baked them at 425F for 13 minutes, at which point a toothpick came out clean. The scones expanded a fair amount, but only some scones had edges touching each other. My scones very seldom brown on top, and these were no exception.
The scones were tender and moist - a little muffin-like while fresh and not browned. The lavender in the scones made them floral; the lemon zest complemented it well. Alex and I agreed that my homemade lemon curd on the scones, although tasty, overwhelmed the lavender. Lavender came through in bites with the herb in it, whereas it was much less intense (and practically nonexistent) in bites without lavender. I wish I had ground the lavender before adding it to the scones to distribute the taste more evenly. These scones would go great with tea - I bet a citrusy Lady Earl Grey tea would be a fantastic pairing, and regular Earl Grey would be nice, too.
This was a standard and easy scone recipe to make; it yields a lot of scones but it would be easy to only make a half batch. I would consider either grinding the lavender before adding it, using a larger quantity, or perhaps steeping it in the milk to try to draw out more of its flavor, instead of adding it to the dry ingredients. Consider skipping lemon curd unless yours was mild.
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