Strawberry Coconut Scones
Issue No. 3: Best scones, my Italy eating vacation, plus the greatest tortilla chips
Welcome back to Dish Lister! I hope you’ve enjoyed the inaugural issues of my newsletter. If you missed any, you can find them in my archives on the Substack app. And also please subscribe below and follow me on Instagram @dishlister if you haven’t already.
Now, on to this week’s dish!
For the love of scones
If I had to choose one baked good to eat exclusively for the rest of my life, it would be the scone. There’s something about their versatility and ease that makes them so perfect. The scone possibilities are endless. Enjoy them sweet, savory, fruity, cheesy, or chocolate chip, raisin, or nut studded. They can be eaten any time of day, equally nice for breakfast or as a soup accompaniment for lunch or dinner. Scones can be shaped any way you like—into angular wedges, squares, or rounds. And while I enjoyed some amazing afternoon tea scones in London (more closely resembling a biscuit), my preferred scone is a bit richer and has a more tender, dense, and crumbly texture than a traditional British scone.
Over the years, I’ve made at least 60 to 70 different scone recipes, and I pride myself in being a bit of a scone connoisseur. From my extensive “research”, these five stand-out recipes have been inducted into my Scone Hall of Fame:
Sour Cream and Fruit Scones from Dawn Perry in the New York Times Cooking app is a great scone recipe because it encourages variation. I’ve tried these with peaches, strawberries, bananas—basically whatever fruit I have on hand.
Glazed Oatmeal Maple Scones Do you remember Starbucks’ maple oat nut scones? This recipe, from Joanna Chang of Flour bakery and shared by Once Upon A Chef, reminds me of those Starbucks scones, only much, much better. The oats give them an extra heartiness and texture that is really nice.
Apple and Cheddar Scones from Smitten Kitchen are the quintessential autumnal scone. Lightly sweet and cheesy and filled with big chunks of apple, these wonderful scones are regularly baking in my oven come fall.
Cheddar Cheese and Scallion Scones from King Arthur Baking are a savory scone that’s perfectly paired with eggs for breakfast or soup for lunch. Feel free to sub a couple tablespoons of chives or other fresh herbs for the scallions, and the “optional” Dijon mustard is a must for added flavor. Like most of the scones on my list, these are best eaten warm out of the oven.
Strawberry Coconut Scones are my own creation (recipe below!), leveraging the best practices I’ve learned, plus a fair bit of trial and error to achieve perfection. If you’re a coconut fan, these super-tender scones will be your jam. And even if you’re not, the coconut flavor is subtle enough to not overpower, so I’d still check them out. You can sub any fruit for the strawberries that pairs well with coconut (like blueberries, raspberries, or bananas).
Give all of these scones a try, and let me know what you think. And if you have your own favorite scone recipe, please share it with me ASAP!
Strawberry Coconut Scones
Makes 8 scones Time: 40 minutes, plus 10 min cooling
2 cups plus 2 tbsp (271 grams) all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting work surface 1 tbsp (14 grams) baking powder. 1/3 cup (67 grams) granulated sugar 1/2 tsp fine sea salt or table salt 6 tbsp (85 grams) cold unsalted butter, cut into half-inch cubes 1 cup (166 g) diced fresh strawberries 1/2 cup (42 grams) shredded unsweetened coconut 2/3 cup (157 ml) chilled coconut cream (see Note), plus more for brushing scones 1 very cold egg, lightly beaten 2 tbsp milk (any kind) Demerara or turbinado sugar, for sprinkling
Adjust oven rack to middle position and preheat oven to 400°F. Line a 13 x 18-inch baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, sugar and salt.
Add the cubed butter to the flour mixture and use your fingers to work the butter into smaller, pea-sized clumps. Gently stir in strawberries and shredded unsweetened coconut. Add the coconut cream, lightly beaten egg, and milk and fold together with a rubber spatula, just until dough begins to form.
Transfer dough to a lightly floured work surface. Using floured hands, gently knead into a ball and then press into a 3/4-inch thick circle. Use a knife or bench scraper to cut dough into 8 triangular wedges and place them on the parchment-lined baking sheet, spacing them about 2 inches apart.
Lightly brush each scone with any remaining coconut cream and sprinkle with a little Demerara or turbinado sugar. Bake for 17-20 minutes, until scones are a light golden brown and firm to the touch. Cool on a wire rack for at least 10 minutes. Serve warm or at room temperature. Enjoy!
Notes:
Scones are best eaten on the day they are made but can be revived nicely in a preheated 350°F oven for 5 minutes or so if you have any leftovers (we rarely do!).
Butter: Make sure to use very cold butter for this recipe (right out of the fridge). Do not try to work it too much into the dry ingredients; you want small, pea-size chunks of butter throughout.
Coconut cream: Not to be confused with cream of coconut (which contains added sugar) or coconut milk (which has more water and is a thinner consistency), coconut cream can usually be found in the Asian food aisle at your local grocery store. For best results (contributing to the more tender crumb), make sure your coconut cream is nice and cold out of the fridge, just like the butter and egg. Also you should have about a scant tablespoon of coconut cream left over to brush the scones with before baking.
To make ahead: Scones can be made and cut into wedges and then frozen until ready to bake. Bake as directed, although you may need to add a few more minutes to your total baking time if they are baked right out of the freezer.
Baking by weight vs. volume: I personally prefer to bake by weight using my food scale (a habit started in culinary school), and I’ve included gram measurements in the recipe as well. Baking by weight is more precise than baking by volume, so the final product is more consistent every time. Also, if you weigh everything directly in your bowl, there’s less stuff (measuring cups and spoons) to wash after- hooray! Rest assured, I’ve made this recipe both by weight and volume, and whichever method you choose, the result will be equally awesome.
My Italy eating experiences
I’m still recovering from my recent family vacation to Italy, after consuming my body weight in delicious pasta and gelato, but it was an amazing trip! My husband, kids and I went into it expecting to try some of the best food of our lives, and because of that, our activities largely centered around eating.
One highlight was doing food tours in Rome and Florence (see my latest Instagram reel @dishlister for some behind-the-scenes fun!). Food tours are one of my favorite ways to explore the food, history, and culture of a region. The tours, often led by locals, allow you to sample a number of signature dishes, while also enjoying some good storytelling on the history and culture. Make sure to arrive very hungry to a tour, as you often get to try at least 5-6 different foods. Tour quality can vary greatly, so do your research on what you might eat on different tours (and the places you might visit) and always read the reviews.
My family and I also took a private cooking class in Italy, just outside of Bologna (in a beautiful villa overlooking the city). We got to choose our menu from a variety of regional dishes and decided on a popular street food called crescentine (fried dough often filled or served with cheese and/ or cured meat), tagliatelle with a truffle sauce, and lasagne verde Bolognese. We made everything from scratch, and it ended up being one of the best meals of our entire trip! Everyone pitched in to make the pasta and crescentine doughs, roll out and shape the pasta, make the sauces, assemble the lasagne, and stuff and fry the crescentine. The dishes we chose were a bit more labor intensive, but the result was worth every bit of effort.
One final vacation highlight was touring facilities where two of my favorite staple Italian foods, Parmigiano Reggiano cheese and balsamic vinegar, are produced. We watched the Parmigiano Reggiano coagulated curds as they were pulled out of their rennet milk baths and prepped for molds. We smelled and tasted samples of aging vinegars (some more than 25 years old) directly out of their large wooden barrels. Eating the different cheeses and vinegars at the end of our tours was an added treat.
Such a memorable vacation for me and my family! For anyone planning to visit Italy, I would highly recommend partaking in these or the many other amazing food experiences that the country has to offer.
Tortilla chips that never fail
One of my biggest food pet peeves is a tortilla chip that flimsily snaps mid-dip. Enter Zack’s Mighty organic tortilla chips. Made from real tortillas, they are super sturdy, holding up to even the most generous scoop of guacamole. Besides endlessly snacking on them, I’ve found so many fun ways to effortlessly sneak them into my meals. They’re perfect crumbled on top of chilis or soups or added to salads for a little extra crunch. Another bonus: these chips were the first ones made with Certified Regenerative Corn, a farming process that’s more beneficial for the soil and helps combat climate change. Needless to say, I’m pretty hooked on the crunchy, salty goodness of Zack’s Mighty.
2024 Best Bites
Since my August vacation, I’ve taken a short hiatus from eating out, and so have no new bites breaking into my top 5. Don’t worry, I’m back in action this weekend at the One Bite Pizza Fest in NYC, where I hope to eat at least one or two list-worthy slices.🤞 Stay tuned…and see my latest/ previous 2024 best bites below:
Cinnamon roll from District Doughnuts (Las Vegas, NV)
Pear ravioli from La Giostra (Florence, Italy)
Mazeman from Konban (NYC)
Stuffed gnocchi from Luigino’s (Montclair, NJ)
Scallops from Mérito (Lima, Peru)
In the next issue of Dish Lister, in honor of back-to-school, I’ll be dishing on some tasty and healthy after school snacks, my go-to (read: easy) weeknight dinner resources, and a new pantry item that I’m completely smitten with.
Until then, as always, please keep the feedback coming (what you like most, what you’d like to see more of)—you can easily drop me a comment right at the bottom of this e-mail. Would love to hear if you try any of the recipes I’ve shared too!
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