Chef Thomas
All-Butter Shortbread Fingers
The plainest biscuit in the tin and the hardest one to stop eating, three ingredients and a slow oven turning good butter into something quietly perfect with a cup of tea.
Culinary Explorer
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Date and Walnut Scones
Created by Chef Thomas
Soft, buttery scones studded with sticky dates and toasted walnuts, the kind of thing you make on a cold afternoon when the kettle is already on and the light is going early.
Pastries & Cookies
British
Comfort Food
Make Ahead
15 min
Active Time
15 min cook•30 min total
Yield8 scones
There's a particular hour in October when the light starts to give up around four, and the only sensible response is to put the oven on. A scone takes half an hour from a cold kitchen to a warm plate, which is one of the more useful facts about baking.
Dates and walnuts belong to this time of year. The dates have that deep, treacly sweetness that wants colder weather around it, and the walnuts taste like the trees they came off, which is to say they taste like autumn. Toasted properly, they smell of woodsmoke and butter and something faintly bitter that keeps the scones from going cloying. Together they make a scone that feels like a small kindness on a grey afternoon.
A scone is a forgiving thing if you let it be. Cold butter, a soft hand, a hot oven. Don't overwork the dough. Don't twist the cutter. Don't open the oven door too soon. Beyond that, a scone is mostly patience and the willingness to stop fussing.
I wrote this one down in the notebook last November, after the leaves had gone and a friend dropped in unexpectedly. "Dates, walnuts, butter, four o'clock." That was the entry. It's still the best note I've made about them.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
self-raising flour
Quantity
350g
plus extra for dusting
baking powder
Quantity
1 teaspoon
fine sea salt
Quantity
pinch
cold unsalted butter
Quantity
75g
cubed
golden caster sugar
Quantity
50g
Medjool dates
Quantity
150g
stoned and roughly chopped
walnut halves
Quantity
75g
toasted and roughly broken
large egg
Quantity
1
whole milk
Quantity
150ml
plus extra for brushing
vanilla extract
Quantity
1 teaspoon
demerara sugar (optional)
Quantity
for the tops
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| self-raising flourplus extra for dusting | 350g |
| baking powder | 1 teaspoon |
| fine sea salt | pinch |
| cold unsalted buttercubed | 75g |
| golden caster sugar | 50g |
| Medjool datesstoned and roughly chopped | 150g |
| walnut halvestoasted and roughly broken | 75g |
| large egg | 1 |
| whole milkplus extra for brushing | 150ml |
| vanilla extract | 1 teaspoon |
| demerara sugar (optional) | for the tops |
Equipment Needed
- •Large mixing bowl
- •6cm round pastry cutter
- •Baking tray lined with parchment
- •Pastry brush
Instructions
- 1
Toast the walnuts
Set the oven to 220C/200C fan. Scatter the walnuts on a baking tray and slide them in for five or six minutes, until they smell warm and nutty and the kitchen starts to feel like autumn. Trust your nose. The moment you can smell them properly, they're done. Tip them onto a board to cool, then break them into rough pieces with your fingers.
Untoasted walnuts are a missed opportunity. Five minutes in a hot oven wakes them up entirely and is the difference between a scone with walnuts in it and a scone that tastes of walnuts. - 2
Rub in the butter
Tip the flour, baking powder and salt into a wide bowl. Add the cold cubed butter and rub it in with your fingertips, lifting the mixture as you go to keep things cool. You're after the texture of coarse breadcrumbs, with the odd larger flake of butter still visible. Stir in the caster sugar.
- 3
Fold in dates and walnuts
Scatter the chopped dates and the toasted walnuts over the flour and turn them through with a knife or your hands until they're evenly distributed. The dates will want to clump. Separate any sticky lumps so each piece is dusted in flour. This stops them turning to glue in the dough.
- 4
Bring the dough together
Beat the egg with the milk and the vanilla in a small jug. Pour most of it into the bowl, holding back a tablespoon or so. Bring the mixture together with a knife at first, then your hands, adding the last of the liquid only if it feels dry. The dough should be soft and shaggy and just hold together. Stop the moment it does. Overworked scone dough goes tough and apologetic.
A scone dough should feel a touch wetter than you think it ought to. Dry dough makes dry scones. Trust the stickiness. - 5
Shape and cut
Tip the dough onto a lightly floured surface and pat it out, gently, to about 3cm thick. Don't roll it. Patting keeps the air in. Cut into rounds with a floured cutter, pressing straight down without twisting. Twisting seals the edges and they won't rise properly. Gather the offcuts, pat them out again, and cut the rest. You should get eight.
- 6
Bake until golden
Place the scones on a baking tray lined with parchment, leaving a little space between each. Brush the tops with the leftover milk and egg, then scatter a pinch of demerara over each one. Bake for twelve to fifteen minutes, until the tops are deeply golden and the bottoms sound hollow when you tap them. The kitchen will smell of toasted walnuts and warm dates and butter. That's the moment.
Eat one while it's still warm enough to melt a knob of butter. This is the cook's privilege, and the only honest way to test a scone.
Chef Tips
- •Medjool dates are worth the extra. They're plump and sticky and taste of toffee, which is what you want here. The dry, pressed-block sort will work, but you'll lose that fudgy give in the middle of the scone, and the fudgy give is half the point.
- •Cold butter and a soft touch. Scones go wrong when the butter melts before they hit the oven, or when the dough has been kneaded into submission. Treat the dough like something you don't quite trust and it'll reward you. Treat it like bread and you'll get hockey pucks.
- •Eat them the day you make them. Scones are not keepers. If you must, split and toast them the next morning, butter them generously, and call it breakfast rather than leftover. Better still, freeze the cut, unbaked rounds and bake them straight from frozen when you want them, adding a few minutes to the time.
- •A pot of strong tea is not optional. This is a scone that asks for it.
Advance Preparation
- •The dough can be patted out, cut into rounds and frozen on a tray, then bagged up once solid. Bake from frozen, adding three or four minutes to the cooking time.
- •Baked scones are best the day they're made. If there are any left, split and toast them the next morning with plenty of butter.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 105g)
Calories
390 calories
Total Fat
15 g
Saturated Fat
6 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
9 g
Cholesterol
45 mg
Sodium
95 mg
Total Carbohydrates
57 g
Dietary Fiber
3 g
Sugars
21 g
Protein
8 g
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