Fresh Red Currant Scones (with recipe)

Sophie loves red currants. Apparently when she was young there was a giant currant bush near her house and she used to nosh on them until her tongue went numb from the tartness. So when her mom found gorgeous fresh currants at a famers market she got them for Sophie. Unfortunately, Sophie's tolerance for tart isn't what it was and she couldn't eat them raw.

What to do with fresh berries? Muffins or scones. She had some blueberries that were going to turn and I wanted to make them into muffins, so I figured currant scones. I based my recipe off the strawberry and chocolate scone recipe from Alice's Tea Cup, but with the fresh currants instead of strawberries (obviously) and no chocolate. They were excellent! The sweet(ish) scone dough contrasted nicely with the tart currants (which were not overly tart since they were slightly over ripe and slightly baked from the oven).


Sophie is a tea connoisseur and she made some sort of orange, floral tea (which was amazingly delicious, and I'm not generally a huge fan of floral or fruit teas). Fruity tea and fruity scones. Perfect!

Recipe (adapted substantially from Alice's Tea Cup):

Fresh currant scones:

• 3 ¼ cups flour
• ½ cups sugar
• ½ tsp baking soda
• 2 ½ tsp baking powder
• 1 ½ sticks (¾ cups) butter, cubed
• 1 cup fresh red currants
• Zest of ½ orange
• Juice of one lemon + milk needed to bring it to 1 ¼ cups liquid

1. Preheat oven to 425*F
2. Mix flour, sugar, baking soda and powder in a large bowl.
3. Cut in the butter with a pastry cutter or your fingers until the mixture resembles course, wet, lumpy sand
4. Toss in the orange zest and the fresh currants
5. Carefully mix in the buttermilk (or lemon and milk mixture) with a fork or rubber spatula
6. Generously coat your counter or a marble block with flour, flour your hands, and turn out the dough
7. Pat it to about 3/4in thick and cut into rounds or wedges
8. Bake until golden, about 8-15 min depending on the size and your oven