Super-delicious Feel-good Scones

This is a bit of a quick entry.  After a long week at work, I came home and just felt a bit out-of-sorts.  Couldn’t really pinpoint the problem… I had just a touch of a headache, a bit of tummy upset, and just generally felt blah.  The solution?  Scones!

A few reasons for these: I wanted something hot-baked, G.I.-friendly, quick, and easy to throw together.  I’d also been meaning to try out the recipe to see if it was any good.  Things came together lickety-split; I had all the ingredients on hand.  I opted for both raisins and dried cranberries in my version, for some nice sweet fruitiness.  I imagine these could also be adapted to a more savoury application, like cheddar cheese and green onion, but I wasn’t in the mood for that.

Whole Wheat Fruit Scones

Adapted from “The G.I. Diet Clinic” by Rick Gallop

 Makes 8 scones

• 1 ½ cups whole wheat flour
• ½ cup wheat bran
• ¼ cup each dried cranberries and raisins (anyone else ever wondered why they don’t just call them “dried grapes”?)
• 2 tbsp Splenda
• 2 tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp salt
• ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
• ¼ cup soft non-hydrogenated margarine
• 2/3 cup buttermilk (or you could use skim milk; I just had buttermilk that was about to expire)

1. Preheat oven to 425ºF
2. In large bowl, combine flour, bran, dried fruit, Splenda, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg.  Using your fingers, rub margarine into flour mixture to combine.  Add buttermilk and toss with fork to form a soft dough.
3. Place dough on floured surface and knead gently about five times.  Pat dough out to ½ inch thickness.  Cut dough into 8 squares, or use cookie or biscuit cutter (I personally cut my round flattened dough shape into eight pie-like wedges)
4. Place on parchment-lined baking sheet and sprinkle just a touch of extra Splenda on the top.  Bake for about 12 minutes or until golden on bottom.
5. Let cool slightly, and enjoy with a hot cup of tea and/or spread them with some jam.

Tasty stuff.  I think, subconsciously, I was trying to recreate the BRATT diet touted as a cure-all by my parents: bananas, rice, applesauce, tea, and toast is what that stood for, I think.  I got some bread and whole grains in there, some fruit (though it wasn't bananas or applesauce), along with tea, so I came pretty close (and avoided the dreaded “tea and toast” mush that mom tried to serve me once.  Yeah.  NOT good eats, though I wholly appreciate her efforts to make me feel better!)

Thinking that that garlic-and-ginger laden Thai shrimp soup probably also has medicinal powers,

-Honeybee