Morning Scones with Apple and Oats

Several weekend mornings  (and the occasional weekday evening) this past year, I’ve woken up (or returned home) to the sprightly sizzle of pancake batter puffing up on the skillet. As a kid my family frequently made weekend breakfasts, consisting of blintz, hash browns, or blueberry pancakes. If it were blintz, I’d help mix the cottage cheese filling—if pancakes, I’d get to drop the blueberries into the just-overturned cakes. (Hashbrowns I left alone—they included onions, which in my youth I deemed slimy and too bold of flavor.) Sometimes I sat and watched the breakfast construction. Sometimes I clambered onto a stool precisely as one of my parents slid a laden plate and already-dripping syrup spout toward me.  Either way, to have this lazy weekend morning serenade of breakfast resume, now courtesy of my roommate, is rather a treat. And this past weekend, I thought I’d take up the task of putting together the breakfast. In lieu of something that requires immediate consumption, I decided to make morning scones.I’ve had mixed success with scones in the past, but this apple-oat rendition is one of the better ones I’ve come across. There's just enough butter to form a tender crumb, and the oats give some toothiness, while the apple chunks make for bursts of smooth, sweet flavor. I didn’t have buttermilk around, so I created sour milk with soy milk and a dash of vinegar to give the scones just the lift they needed.

Adapted from Martha Stewart's Apple and Oat Scones

Morning Scones with Apple and Oats

Ingredients:

1 2/3 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour

1 1/3 cups rolled oats

¼ cup plus 2 TBSP brown sugar

½ tsp. ground cinnamon

½ tsp. ground nutmeg

2 tsp. baking powder

¾ tsp. baking soda

½ tsp. salt

½ cup (1 stick) cold butter, diced (use margarine if making vegan)

1 ½ cups chopped apple (I used one large gala)

2/3 cup buttermilk or sour milk

Directions:

--Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Mix together flour, oats, brown sugar, spices, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Cut in butter with two knives or a pastry blender until it’s in pea-sized pieces. Add apples and buttermilk and stir with a spoon until incorporated. Use hands to press dough into a disk.

--Flour a cutting board. Flatten dough into a rectangle, about 6 by 8 inches. Use a sharp knife to cut into 12 triangles. Place on two ungreased cookie sheets, making sure the scones don’t touch.

--Bake scones for 18-20 minutes, or until tops are golden brown.