Banana Scones

Banana Scones

I love scones!  Like muffins, they can be savory or sweet.  Scones have a sophistication that muffins lack (and they travel better than muffins!).  However, it wasn't until recently that I tried my hand a baking them.  One of my granddaughters has an egg allergy, so I'm always looking for recipes without eggs--scones are perfect!  I always have bananas on hand because my granddaughters love them, but they do tend to go bad relatively quickly.  When I found myself just short of enough bananas for banana bread, I decided to try this recipe for scones--they are delicious!

Recipe:  Makes 8 scones

Ingredients:

**2 very ripe bananas (about 8 oz or 1 cup once mashed)

**2--4 tablespoons of milk, whole or 2% (I used 1%)

**1/2 cup (4 oz) plain yogurt (I used nonfat plain greek yogurt)

**2 1/2 cups (12.5 oz) all-purpose flour (I used half all purpose and whole wheat flour)

**4 tablespoons (1 1/2 oz) granulated sugar

**2 teaspoons baking powder

**1 teaspoon salt

**1 teaspoon cinnamon

**4 tablespoons (2 oz) salted butter

**1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional) (I used half walnuts and half pecans because that's what I had)

Directions:

Mash the bananas and add enough milk to make one total cup (if necessary). Stir in the yogurt and set aside.

Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon in a large bowl.  Cut the butter into several pieces.  Work it into the dry ingredients using a fork, pastry cutter, or your fingers until there are no pieces of butter larger than a pea.

Pour the banana-yogurt mixture into the bowl  with the flour and stir just enough to incorporate all the flour.  Fold in the walnuts, if using.  This will be a fairly wet dough.  NOTE:  I had to add about 1/4 cup of milk to incorporate all the flour and make a wet dough.

Line a dinner plate with a piece of wax paper and turn the dough out on top.  Pat into a disk about 1-inch thick and cover with another piece of wax paper.  Freeze the scone dough approximately 45 minutes.  Take the dough out and cut (score) into 8 sections.  At this point, the dough can be baked or returned to the freezer.  I actually put the dough back into the freezer and baked them the next morning.  When you're ready to bake the scones, preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.  

Remove the scone dough from the freezer and peel off the top layer of wax paper and invert the scones onto a parchment lined baking sheet. Peel off the second layer of wax paper.  At this point, I cut through the still frozen scone dough to separate the sections.  Pull the sections apart just a bit to give them some room to expand.

Bake for 25--30 minutes, until the scones are firm to the touch and turning golden-brown on the edges.  Cool completely and cut apart any scones that baked together with a sharp knife.  Enjoy them as they are, with butter, or, as my husband likes them, with a little butter and syrup!  They're de-lish!

Nutritional information (approximate):

Calories:  316

Total Fat:  11.6 g

Saturated Fat:  4.3 g

Polyunsaturated Fat:  4.1 g

Monosaturated Fat:  2.2 g

Cholesterol:  15.9 mg

Sodium:  464 mg

Potassium:  215.4 mg

Carbohydrates:  46.4 g

Fiber:  2.4 g

Sugar:  11 g

Protein:  8.4 g

Banana Bread

My family loves banana bready; unfortunately, bananas rarely get ripe enough to make banana bread in my house.  My granddaughters love them, so they go quickly!  Recently, however, I found myself with a bunch of 6 bananas that were about to be too ripe to bake anything with.  I decided this was a perfect time to experiment.  I made two loaves; the first loaf followed the following recipe:

Banana Bread
    *Prep:  15 minutes
    *Cook:  55 minutes
    *Yield:  12 servings (depending upon how thick or thin you slice it!)
*Ingredients:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 cup butter, melted
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups mashed ripe bananas (about 3 bananas)
1 (6 ounce) container nonfat Greek yogurt (plain or vanilla)
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
cooking spray
*Preparation:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Combine flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, butter, eggs, bananas, yogurt, pecans, and vanilla in a large bowl.  Mix well (a mixer isn't necessary; I used a wooden spoon).  Pour batter into an 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 inch loaf pan coated with cooking spray.  Bake at 350 degrees for 55 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean (I baked mine about 7 additional minutes; adjust to your oven).  Cool 10 minutes on a wire rack; remove from pan.  Cool completely on wire rack.

One of my granddaughters has an egg allergy, so for the second loaf I made the following substitutions: 
         *1/2 cup sugar and 1/2 cup Splenda replaced the 2 cups of sugar
         *3 teaspoons of Egg Replacer +4 tablespoons of water replaced the two eggs

As the two loaves baked, they both rose and browned beautifully; however, as the slimmed down version cooled, it fell flat which created a denser bread.  A subsequent "taste test" by family members rendered the verdict that both loaves tasted exactly the same; the only difference was that the loaf that uses part Splenda and Egg Replacer was flatter and denser.  I deem the experiment a success!