Growing up I loved scones. And by scones, I mean these Utah Scones: fried pieces of sweet bread dough that we would douse in honey or dust with powdered sugar. One night when I was in middle school, it was pronounced that we had scones in the house. Imagine my horror when I discovered that these scones resembled triangular biscuits. HORROR.
And then I tasted one and all was forgiven. Sweet but not too sweet, melt-in-your mouth texture, flaky, buttery, and crumbly in the best possible way. I adapted this recipe from Pam Anderson at Three Many Cooks. I loved the scone base, but wanted to switch up the flavors, thus these Lemon Poppy Seed Scones were born! They are tender and delicious, with the bright addition of lemon in both the dough and the glaze. They are perfect for brunch, serving to visitors, or enjoying after a meal.
Ingredients Needed
This is just a preview of ingredients and method, keep scrolling for full printable recipe.
Scones
- All purpose flour – Be sure you’re measuring your flour by scooping it into your measuring cup and leveling it off with a knife. If you scoop your flour, you run the risk of a dense, dry finished product.
- Granulated sugar
- Baking powder
- Baking soda
- Table salt
- Poppy seeds
- Unsalted butter – This recipe is designed for real butter. Substitute at your own risk! You’ll notice this recipe calls for frozen butter. That’s because we’re going to grate it straight from the freezer so it holds together in the dough and creates light, fluffy layers in the finished scone.
- Sour cream – Use full fat sour cream for the best texture.
- Egg
- Lemon zest – Freshly zested!
Glaze
- Lemon juice – Freshly squeezed and strained, please! Avoid using bottled lemon juice here.
- Melted butter
- Powdered sugar
How to Make Lemon Poppy Seed Scones
- First you’re going to combine some all purpose flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt and poppy seeds.
- To that we add some grated frozen butter. This is mixed gently because you don’t want a cohesive dough here. The pieces of butter will melt as the scones cook and create the soft, fluffy layers we’re looking for.
- Next you’ll whisk up and egg with some full-fat sour cream and drizzle that over your flour mixture then combine with a fork and press together with your hands to create a dough. It may seem dry, but keep working and it will come together.
- Then you’ll just transfer that dough ball to a lightly floured surface and roll into a disk, cut into 8 triangles, separate and bake.
- While the scones are baking you will whisk up a super simple glaze of lemon juice, powdered sugar, and butter. Let the sones cool a little and then top with the glaze. If you glaze while they are still warm, you can spread the glaze thin over the whole top and let it drip down the sides a little, which is my personal favorite. If you wait until they are completely cool, you can pipe on some thick glaze squiggles that will hold their shape on the top.
Storing and Other Tips
- Store cooled scones in an airtight container at room temperature and enjoy within a day or two for best results.
- For longer storage, freeze unglazed scones for up to 3 months. Thaw and glaze before serving.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes. Shape and cut the scones, then cover and refrigerate overnight. Bake directly from the refrigerator, adding a minute or two to the baking time if needed.
Frozen butter stays cold and holds its shape as it’s worked into the flour. Those little bits of solid butter in the dough are what create the tender, flakey texture of the finished scones. If you forgot to freeze your butter, you can always use a pastry cutter or a couple of knives to cut refrigerated butter into the dough. Freezing and grating just makes this step much less labor intensive!
Yes. Divide the dough into two portions, roll into disks, and cut into small scones. Begin checking for doneness several minutes earlier than you would for large scones, as they will cook more quickly.
Lemon Poppy Seed Scones
Ingredients
Scones
- 2 cups all-purpose flour lightly spooned into measuring cups and leveled with a knife
- ⅓ cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon table salt decrease or omit if using salted butter
- 1 teaspoon poppy seeds
- 8 tablespoons unsalted butter frozen
- ½ cup full-fat sour cream
- 1 large egg
- zest of 1 lemon
Glaze
- ¼ cup strained lemon juice
- 2 tablespoons melted butter
- 1 ⅓ cup powdered sugar
Instructions
Scones
- Preheat oven to 400℉. Place baking rack in the middle-low position. Line a baking sheet with parchment or a Silpat and set aside.
- In a medium bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and poppy seeds. Add the lemon zest and whisk together again.
- Grate the frozen butter (a food processor makes that job super easy, but you can also just do it on a regular box grater). Toss the grated butter into the flour mixture and combine it with your fingers until it resembles coarse meal. Set aside.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the sour cream and egg. Drizzle it over the flour mixture and then toss the mixture together with a fork until everything appears moistened. Gently press the dough into a ball–it will take some time and some parts of the dough will be more moist than other parts, but continue pressing together until it forms a ball.
- Lightly flour a surface (you can use the lined baking sheet if you want) and place the dough on top of the floured surface. Press into an 8″ disc and cut into equal wedges with a butter knife. Separate the wedges and place them evenly on the baking sheet. Bake in the preheated oven for 15-17 minutes or until lightly golden. Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Glaze
- While the scones are cooling, whisk together the glaze ingredients until smooth. Place in a Ziploc bag and drizzle over the scones. You can do it while they’re still warm so it spreads over the top and sides of the scone (which I kind of love) or you can wait until they’re completely cool and drizzle squigglies over the scones. Makes 8 scones.
Questions & Reviews
Just made these after seeing the recipe a few days ago and craaaaving them! They turned out great! I got a lot more than eight too, more like 14 which is kind of nice! They are delicious! and I have never grated butter before- that is awesome. and looks like shiny curly shredded mozzarella. (hmm…that substitution may be a funny april fools joke…) Loved this recipe!
You have the most gorgeous way of displaying each sweetie and your recipes make it easy for a poor old cook like me to follow every instruction without worry and I hope you will let me subscribe to your beautiful Bakery. Every other bakery I used for a recipe, gave me half of the recipe and then insisted I join or I could not have the rest of the recipe. I was just asked to leave a lovely bakery because they came back and said my email was phony. I’ve had the same email for 21 years but I had to leave. You lovely kind people let me take my time writing each recipe and I’m going to tell all of my Baker Friends where they should go for outstanding recipes and delightful people. Thank you so much and I wish you continued success. Sincerely..Sandy Malcolm.
It should be a crime to have something taste so good! We subbed Greek yogurt for the sour cream because that is what we had. We also had to add a bit more than it called for but they were tender and so delicious!
If I put this dough in the fridge overnight, would it still cook up OK? I want to make these for my mom for Mothers’ Day breakfast, but, you see, we have 9 o’clock church, which makes it difficult.
You can substitute anything – really the sky’s the limit. I’ve made blueberry/lemon, orange craisin, cherry/almond, lemon poppy, cinnamon/raisin, chocolate chip, and 1 with white chocolate. So get your imagination working!!! I don’t measure the “add-ins”; whatever looks right to you is right!!! Bon Apetit!
Made these last week! Chucked in some coconut instead of poppy seeds ( as didn’t have any) and they were fab!
Now a craving I get fortnightly.
Have you ever considered placing your unbaked scones on the baking sheet close together? They come out amazingly perfect…no rough edges and soooo tender all the way through! Learned this from a farmers market this weekend! Let me know what you think!
I juat made these and they are superb! I didn’t have lemon, so used orange zest and orange juice for the glaze. It is super hot here in Gridley, so my frozen butter didn’t grate, just blobbed. I used a pastry cutter and it was fine. The coconut lime version above sounds fantastic. Love this blog!
I made a coconut lime version of these. THey were A-M-A-Zing!!! I used lime zest in place of lemon and 1/3 cup toasted coconut in place of poppy seeds. I also added a little untoasted coconut on top before baking. Then I juiced the lime and added powdered sugar to drizzling consistency for the glaze. Awesome awesome awesome.
Made these this morning and they are wonderful, tasty and so pretty!! I had a bit of a challenge with the butter but managed just fine. Loved that my kitchen smelled like fresh lemon. I think I’ll try doing 2-4″ rounds and making 16 smaller scones. I didn’t have my glaze ready when they were fresh out of the oven so I definitely will do that next time so they look more like a glaze (mine turned out like a frosting) and put on when the scones are warm. So I want to try blueberry scones next…yum!
Thanks for the wonderful recipe!