Mini Chocolate Chip Scones

Difficult: No way.
Time consuming: About 30 minutes to make, a 30 minute rest, and 20 minutes to bake.

 

I saw these mini chocolate chip scones on Pinterest and knew they would be my next sweet for our special ed team meeting.  Honestly, I had never had a scone before - which is actually pretty terrible considered I spent 10 days in London on spring break for a study abroad my freshman year of college.  So I didn't really know what to expect but these were great!...especially with a cup of coffee!!  These were sweet with bursts of chocolate in every bite. They have a drier texture compared to a cookie (making it so dunkworthy) but I really love how they turned out.  And the glaze was super easy to apply and helps hold in some moisture so they can last a few days before going stale (but only if they last that long!)

Prebaked.  They can all get squished pretty close on a baking pan.

I've been doing a crazy amount of baking with the holiday's coming up...so many great treats to share on here (eventually). First I made cut out sugar cookies, then I made these scones, then hot chocolate cupcakes with marshmallow buttercream to share at school, then hot chocolate cookies for a cookie exchange, then all the rest of my regular holiday baking (which I'm toning down this year to a chocolate cookie, my cut out cookies, peppermint shortbread, and soft ginger cookies).  Phew.  It's getting exhausting but I am loving every minute of it :)

 

The Recipe:

yields 32-64 scones, depending on how you cut them

 Ingredients:
Scones:
 2 3/4 cups all purpose flour
1/3 cup granulated, white sugar (I used vanilla sugar)
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 cup (1 stick) cold butter, cut into pats
1-2 cups mini chocolate chips (I used 1 bag, which is two full cups)
2 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract (but if you don't have it, you can up the vanilla to a full 2 teaspoons)
1/2 to 2/3 cup milk

Glaze: (honestly I had so much extra, you could probably reduce the quantities listed below but I haven't tried)
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
7 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
 
Directions:

Before you start, line a large (18"x13") baking pan with parchment paper, and set aside.

1. In a large bowl, whisk flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder together.  Cut in the butter with a pastry blender or 2 forks.  The mixture will be unevenly crumbly and some large chunks of butter might remain, but that's ok.  Stir in your chocolate chips.

2.  In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, vanilla extract, almond extract, and 1/2 cup of milk.

3.  Add liquid ingredients to dry ingredients and stir until all the flour mixture has been moistened and the dough seems to stick together.  If it seems too dry, add a little more milk until it forms a nice dough.

4.  Well flour a work surface, and scrape the dough into a ball.  Roll it into an 8"x8" square, it should be about 3/4" thick.  Cut into 2" squares (so you have 16 squares), then cut each square diagonally into a triangle.  (I used a pizza cutter).  Transfer the triangles to the baking pan (I used an offset spatula to help with this) - you can keep them pretty close together because they don't spread a lot during baking.  All the triangles should fit onto one large baking pan.

5.  Pop the pan of scones into the freezer for 30 minutes.  In the meantime, preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

6.  After they chill, bake for 17-20 minutes, rotating the pan once during baking.  They'll be golden brown when their done. (Note: at 19 minutes, the bottoms on mine were on the verge of being over done).

7.  If you want smaller scones, cut each triangle in half down the center as soon as they come out of the oven (if you do this, you'll have 64 small triangles).  I didn't cut mine again, but I wish I would've made some of them smaller, it's nice to have the option of a small snack or just a bite.

8.  Let them cool on the pan for 10 minutes.  Then pop into the freezer for 10 minutes to quickly cool them.

9.  Prepare the glaze by mixing the powdered sugar, water, and extract in a bowl with a whisk.  Line a baking sheet with wax paper, pour a little less than half the glaze into the pan.  Take the scones out of the freezer and place them into the glaze.  Pour the remaining glaze over the scones.  Using a pastry brush, schmear the glaze all of the tops and the sides of the scones.

10.  Transfer the scones to a cooling rack and let the excess glaze drip off (I put wax paper under my rack to catch drips).  Allow the glaze to set before serving.

Recipe slightly adapted from King Arthur Flour.  Head on over there for some great step-by-step pictures.