Tart Cherry Scones

For this month's International Incident Party by Jeroxie, with co-hosts Anh and Cherrie, the theme is scones.

This is another recipe from this month's Book Club, keeping with the theme of English tea snacks. It also is the first time I baked with coconut concentrate, which is a becoming a more versatile ingredient in my kitchen as of late.

If you've been noticing, I still cannot get enough of these dried tart cherries from my local co-op. I'm fairly certain I may need to join a support group to break my habit of using them in nearly every dish I cook, but they're that good! They paired beautifully with these scones and added a tone of sweetness to match with the sweeter cornmeal dough. These are the easiest and best scones I've made to date. The scones are not sweet like typical sugary desserts, but are just enough to satisfy my wicked sweet tooth.

Tart Cherry Scones
Printable Recipe

1 large egg
1/2 cup cream
1 2/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup cornmeal
1/3 cup turbinado
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp kosher salt
6 tbsp butter, diced
1/4 cup coconut concentrate
3/4 cup dried tart cherries

1 egg yolk + 1 tbsp raw milk
1/4 cup turbinado

Preheat the oven to 400*F and butter a cookie sheet. In a small bowl, whisk together the egg and cream. In a large bowl, stir together the ingredients of flour through salt. Mix in the butter so it is incorporated, but not creamed. It should be pea sized, and this can be done by hand or carefully with a mixer. Add the egg mixture and coconut concentrate, stirring to combine and make the dough wet. Then add the dried tart cherries and mix until just incorporated.

Using your hands, shape the dough into a ball and lay on parchment paper. On the counter, press the dough into a disk about 2" tall and 8" wide with a floured rolling pin.

Use a knife to cut the dough into 8 equal wedges.

Place the scones onto the greased cookie sheet and brush with the egg yolk and milk mixture. Then sprinkle each scone liberally with turbinado. Bake for 22-25 min until the edges are browned.

~Yields 8 scones.

~Recipe adapted from David Lebovitz.

Update: Hello! Thanks for your kind comments and questions about the coconut concentrate. I've included two photos below of the bottle from Tropical Traditions. It's a mixture of coconut meat and oil, so it's very thick, like honey. It's a wonderful and very versatile ingredient to have in the kitchen. They have sales and specials often, so visit their website if you'd like to order some of your own!

Kiwi Lime Tarts

These little sweets disappeared so fast a few weeks ago at Book Club, I almost forgot about them. The theme that night was English tea snacks since we had read Holly's Inbox. The book was a light, comical read. I enjoy English humor, so I found the book fun and different with the format of reading e-mails in the main character's work inbox. It was a nice escape from our more dramatic history reads, although we've returned to that again without realizing it beforehand.

We take turns hosting, so I started everyone off with some sandwiches - chicken tarragon & tuna salad, plus my famous egg curry, which I'll have to remember to share another time. Then we enjoyed some tart cherry scones and these kiwi lime tarts.

The most time consuming aspect of making these tarts are pressing the crust into the tiny molds, otherwise the recipe is fairly simple. I picked up the little molds at Bed, Bath, & Beyond at around 3 for $1, so I grabbed 15 in all so they could be prepared all at once, although one large tart pan can also be used.

I love the combination of kiwi and lime, plus I had some curd left over to enjoy on its own. The crust was light and flaky, with the sweet and tart curd filling that made it a perfect summer dessert. Make sure to have a fine mesh sieve on hand to filter the curd since some of the eggs are likely to cook, plus the smooth and creamy texture is a must for these sweets.

Kiwi Lime Tarts

Printable Recipe

Curd

1/2 cup turbinado
1 stick butter, sliced into tbsp
2 limes, fully zested and juiced
2 eggs, lightly beaten

In a small sauce pan, add the turbinado, butter, lime zest & juice and bring to a boil, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Remove from the burner and lower heat to medium-low. In a small bowl with the beaten eggs, add a large spoonful of the lime mixture while whisking to warm the eggs. Then add the egg mixture into the pan and return to the stove. Continue to stir the curd for 5-7 min until it is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.

Using a fine mesh sieve, pour the curd through the sieve into a clean bowl and discard the solids. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, making sure the wrap touches the curd, and place in the refrigerator while preparing the crust.

Crust

1 large egg yolk
2 tbsp cold water
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup turbinado
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1 stick butter, sliced into tbsp

Preheat the oven to 375*F. In a small bowl, whisk together the egg yolk, water, and vanilla; set aside. In a mixer, add the remaining ingredients and blend just until the butter turns into tiny pieces. Then add the egg yolk mixture and blend until the dough is just coming together.

Using your hands, add approximately 2 tbsp of crust to a mini tart shell and press into all the nooks and crannies, making sure to leave an indentation for the curd. Once all the shells are filled, place on a baking sheet and bake in the oven for 15-17 min, watching closely so that they are light brown and not burned. Remove from the oven and allow them to cool slightly for 10 min. Once cool, remove the curd from the refrigerator and add 1 tbsp to each tart.

To add the kiwi garnish, peel and slice a kiwi. Then quarter each slice and add one piece to each tart. Serve immediately or keep cool in the refrigerator until serving time.

~Yields 15 mini tarts.

~Crust recipe from Sweet Mary & Curd adapted from Williams-Sonoma.

Flatbread Pizzas

 Sunflower Seeded Flatbread with Ricotta Cheese, D'Anjou Pears, & Walnuts

Inspired by 101 Cookbooks

Pairs wonderfully with Apple Butter

One of my favorite things to do every month is meet for book club. I am an avid reader, at least I thought I was before I joined my book club - some of those girls have put me to shame! - and think it's a fantastic way to discover new authors, new friends, and new things about myself.

It's a quaint little club, just four of us in total, but we meld together better than anyone could have written on paper. Each of us is entertained discovering our likes and differences, and it turns out we enjoy discussing much more outside of the novel's pages.

Once a month we take turns hosting, and without much discussion, snacks were laid out at each meeting. We have seemed to turn our focus as equally onto the food as to the storyline at hand. When word got out that I blogged about food, the expectations were raised. I decided to cook a little extra for my hosting duties this month, which worked out well since our appetites usually call for something above the established peckish fare.

Parmesan Flatbread

Recipe by Cooking with Amy

Two to Try: Smoked Mozzarella & Seasoned Tomato

The current trend in the food world seems to be flatbread pizzas. These quick recipes offer a broader array of doughs and toppings than the regular standard. I gathered a few recipes, completed my grocery shopping, and finished as much as I could the night before.

Thankfully, the club members enjoyed being my taste testers. I was hesitant to brag preemptively, so I clued them in. All my tasting time was taken up with (rushed) photography time before the ladies were scheduled to arrive. My awesomeness prevailed recipes were a success, and I even have one more I didn't have time to make on this night to share in the future.

Thank you, ladies, for your kind words! They highly recommend you try these flatbread pizzas, as do I.

Dill Flatbread

Printable Recipe

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tbsp fresh dill, chopped

1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp kosher salt

1/2 cup water

1/3 cup olive oil

cornmeal

Preheat oven with pizza stone* to 450*F. In a mixer with a spiral dough hook**, blend together the flour through salt. Next add the water and oil slowly, and allow the dough to be worked for no more than 4 min. Divide the dough in half and round each into a ball.

Using your hands, or an oiled rolling pin, roll the dough out into a thin sheet, approximately 10" in diameter on a pizza peel dusted with cornmeal to prevent sticking (or tin foil with cornmeal dusted on top of the dough and then flipped onto the pizza stone or baking sheet). Once the dough is flat, slide the dough into the oven and cook for 10 - 12 min, depending on level of browning desired. Repeat with second flatbread dough.

After allowing the flatbread to cool, cut into small pieces for snacking. This flatbread goes well with hummus. Also, adding toppings and placing the flatbread under the broiler for 3 min makes a delicious pizza (it's better to undercook the dough if adding toppings to prevent the dough from burning). 

~Yields 2 10" flatbreads.

~Adapted from Smitten Kitchen.

I used butter and yukon gold potatoes.

*I bought my pizza stone at Bed, Bath, & Beyond from Oneida for $15. However, a baking sheet can be used instead.

** The spiral dough hook works better than the traditional, in my opinion. You could also just use your hands!