Strawberry Scones with Almond
on Apr 22, 2021, Updated Apr 27, 2024
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There is berry flavor in every crumb of these lovely strawberry scones. They are fragrant with almond extract mixed into the dough. Good news is that they are a simple drop scone recipe. They have that wonderfully crumble texture on the inside with a nice crust on the outside, which is what you should expect from a batch of scones.
Also bake these lemon blueberry scones for another berry option.
Table of Contents
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
There’s no better way to celebrate strawberry season. The moment prices come down on berries at the grocery, I fill up my cart. Besides enjoying them with Greek yogurt and homemade granola, baking with strawberries is fantastic way to enjoy them.
No shaping is required. That’s why I am such a fan of drop scones. They are charming and rustic with their bumpy, cracked and imperfect shapes. You save so much time by just scooping the dough to portion it out instead of rolling it and using a biscuit cutter.
You can make the dough ahead of time, and freeze it. There are multiple points in this recipe where you can either refrigerate the dough to hold off on baking. Freezing is another option if you want to saving some of them for another time.
What is a Scone?
With similar ingredients and how you make them, scones and biscuits are cousins from different continents. Originally from Scotland, in Britain scones are served for tea. (They’re good with a hot cup of coffee too). They have a delicate crust on the outside and are fluffy and soft in the middle. The should be somewhat crumbly when you split one in half.
Scone are a little sweeter than an American style biscuit that you would serve as a savory breakfast or dinner roll, but I wouldn’t say that are sweet like a muffin. You can eat scones for breakfast or for an afternoon snack with tea or coffee.
The Ingredients
This is what you need:
- Strawberries: You can use either fresh strawberries or frozen strawberries. They should be hulled and sliced.
- Flour: Just use basic all-purpose flour. This will give the scones the a tender, layered centered.
- Butter: It’s important that your unsalted butter is chilled and firm. The method is different than when you cream the butter and sugar for cookies. With scones you cut or rub the butter in smaller pieces into the flour. You only can do this with cold butter.
- Sugar: The scones are lightly sweetened with granulated sugar.
- Baking powder is the leavening agent that makes the scones rise.
- Salt brings out the overall flavor in savory and sweet recipes. You don’t need that much.
- Egg: You whisk one large egg with the other of the wet ingredients before pouring them into the dry ingredients.
- Milk: You can use any type of milk from skim to reduced fat to even oat milk. Some scone recipes use heavy cream, but that’s not an ingredient I usually have in my fridge.
- Almond extract adds nutty flavor. Strawberries and almonds are so good together.
- Vanilla extract gives the scones a hint of vanilla flavor.
How To Make Strawberry Scones
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
1. Combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl. That includes the flour, sugar, baking soda, salt and lemon zest.
2. Cut the butter into the flour mixture. You can use a fork or a pastry blender (also known as a pastry cutter) to push the cold cubed butter into the flour. What you should end up with are pea-sized clumps or big coarse crumbs throughout the flour. Those pieces of butter mixed into the dough will release steam while they bake and give the scones their layered crumb.
3. Whisk together the wet ingredients, including the egg, milk and vanilla & almond extract, in a separate bowl.
4. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. You will end up with a very shaggy dough. Assuming your bowl is big enough, you don’t need to turn out the dough on a lightly floured surface to do this. It can all stay in the bowl.
5. Stir the strawberries into the dry ingredients. Then pour in the wet ingredients. Use your hands to press the dough together into a ball. You don’t want to overwork it or the scones will be tough, and the berries are more likely to stain the dough.
6. Scoop the dough onto each baking sheet. I like using a cookie scoop to do this, but you can also with your hands. The balls should be a heaping 1/4 cup to 1/3 cup full of dough. Bake the scones until they are light golden brown and cracked on the top. This will take about 18-20 minutes. Cool them on a wire rack.
7. Whisk together the glaze ingredients including powdered sugar, milk, vanilla extract and almond extract.
8. Drizzle the glaze over the cooled scones. Wait for the glaze to set before serving.
Storage & Freezing
Scones are best eaten the day they are baked. That’s why I always freeze them unbaked. Portion out the dough on a sheet pan lined with parchment or waxed paper. Then freeze them. Once they are solid, you can put all the scone balls into the same container. This makes it so easy to bake them as you want to eat them. Keep in mind that you cannot freeze the glaze. You would have to make a fresh batch.
If you do go ahead and bake the entire batch, store them up to 2 days in an airtight container at room temperature. Bake them in a 300-degree F oven for a few minutes to get the outside crust back.
If you freeze baked scones. Thaw them in a 325-degree F oven for 12-14 minutes. The glaze will get a little gooey.
Recipe Tips
The butter has to be to be cold, or it will be challenging to cut it into the flour mixture. You should be able to see small clumps of flour-covered butter before you add the wet ingredients.
Don’t overwork the dough. That’s why I like to press together the dough pieces with my hands after I stir it and once it’s looking shaggy. If you over mix it, the scones will be tough and not rise as much.
You can make the dough up to 3 days in advance. Keep it all in the bowl and just cover it. Or portion out the dough and cover it in the fridge.
Take advantage of how you can freeze scone dough. Since freshly baked scones have the best flavor and texture, think how many you are going to eat at once before you bake all of them. I keep a bag of frozen portioned scone dough in my freezer at all times. Then I can have a baked scone even on the busiest morning.
Recipe FAQs
Yes, you can stir 1/4 cup thinly sliced almonds into the dry ingredients. You also could sprinkle the tops of the scones with almonds when you glaze them.
No, you don’t have to bother with the glaze. Remember that you have almond extract mixed into the wet ingredients, so you will get that flavor. You can leave the scone tops plain or brush the portioned dough with milk and sprinkle them with coarse sugar before you bake them. That gives you a little sparkle and crunch.
More Scone Recipes
Strawberry Scones with Almond
Ingredients
For scones
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 3 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
- 6 ounces 1-1/2 sticks chilled unsalted butter, cubed
- 1 cup sliced strawberries, either fresh or frozen (do not thaw if frozen)
- 1 large egg
- 3/4 cup milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
For glaze
- 1 cup confectioners’ sugar
- 2 tablespoons milk
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Line 2 sheet pans with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, stir together the all-purpose flour, baking powder, granulated sugar and salt.
- Use a fork or pastry blender to cut the butter into the dry ingredients, until it resembles pea-sized clumps. You can also rub the butter and flour together with your fingers. Fold in the strawberries.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the egg, milk, vanilla extract and almond extract. Stir into the flour-butter mixture. The dough will turn into clumps. Then you can press it together.
- Drop the dough by 1/4-cup-full mounds on the sheet pans spreading 3 inches apart.
- Bake until golden brown, about 18-20 minutes.
- Cool the scones on a wire rack.
- For the glaze, whisk together the confectioners’ sugar, milk, vanilla extract and almond extract in a small bowl. Spoon the glaze over the cooled scones. Let the glaze set before serving. (If the glaze seems too thick, add a little milk, and if it is too thin, add a little confectioner’s sugar.)
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Do you think this recipe would work with almond flour, flax egg and almond milk?
For milk, I prefer substituting oat milk in baking. I haven’t tried to make these with a flax egg or almond flour, but I do think both will really enhance the nutty flavor.
Do you think these would work with gluten free flour cup 4 cup)? Thanks!
What delicious scones.