Sweet Potato Apple Muffin Scones

So. Yesterday I made the most amazing muffin/scone things ever. I mean, you will have to freeze all of them right away so you don’t eat all of them. They are fluffy. They are moist. They are sweet. They are healthy!

I kid you not.

This is adapted from a berry scone recipe in the book Gluten Free on a Shoestring, which my lovely Grandma gave me.

Here are the ingredients. This list is not entirely accurate because I had to make adjustments. So… go by feel.

~ 2 cups of all purpose gluten free flour – make sure that about 1/3 – 1/2 of this flour is almond meal flour. It is very fluffy and moist flour.

~ 1 teaspoon of xanthan gum – to hold things together.

~ 1 tablespoon of baking powder

~ ½ teaspoon of salt

~ 2 tablespoons of sugar – I used 2 tablespoons of brown sugar and 1 of white. I couldn’t help it.

~ 5 tablespoons of cold unsalted butter, diced – I used fake butter because it’s all I had, I’d recommend real, though the fake stuff worked.

~ 1 cup of milk – the recipe says no non-fat which is all I had and it seemed to work alright.

~ 1 sweet potato, boiled, peeled and pureed

~ 1 apple diced

 And the directions...

1. Boil the sweet potato, peel and puree it. You can use some of the milk to help the puree go more smoothly. Stick it in the fridge to cool while you do other things, like dicing the apple. I used my sweet potato hot and I believe it changed the consistency of my scone/muffins.

2. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Prepare baking sheets or muffin tins with either parchment paper or cooking spray, dust with flour if you like.

3. Combine dry ingredients and transfer a few tablespoons to your bowl of diced apples. Giving them a thin covering of the mix helps them not sink to the bottom while baking.

4. Add the diced butter to the dry ingredients – this is where the scones are separated from the muffins – the butter must be cold. This is also why we want the sweet potato cold, so it doesn’t melt the butter. Cut the butter into the mix with a fork, pastry cutter or two knives. Do this until you have pea sized chunks.

5. Cut the cold sweet potato puree into the mix.

6. Add the milk to the mix. Without the sweet potato this would turn the mix into dough. With the sweet potato this turns the mix into batter. You can either add the milk slowly until you get a workable dough or do as I did and dump it all in and add more flour until the batter was gloppy(see step 8b below). I think I probably added a half cup of flour and still came out with muffin-like things.

7. Mix in the apples.

If you have successfully created a dough, continue with the scone steps:

8a. Handle dough as little as possible or butter will melt and you’ll have muffins or something else. Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface and pat into a rectangle about ½ inch thick.

9a. Cut the dough into 8 triangles and transfer them to the baking sheets a couple inches apart. Brush with a bit of milk and sprinkle with a little sugar.

10a. Bake for 15-20 minutes until the scones are puffed up and slightly brown around the edges. Serve immediately. Or go for a run while they cool and freeze those suckers.

If you have inadvertently created a batter by following my instructions or whatever:

8b. If you added all the milk you will probably have a somewhat runny batter. Add flour until it is “gloppy.” I.e.: when you can scoop out a huge spoonful and set it on a baking sheet without it spreading out. Use either muffin tins or baking sheets. Shape the batter however you like. These will not look like scones.

9b. Bake for 15-20 minutes until the edges are slightly brown.

10b. While these are baking you should make a drizzle for the scone/muffins as they might not be sugary enough. This is not true but you should do it anyway. Mix a couple tablespoons of brown sugar with about 1-2 teaspoons of cinnamon, ½ tablespoon of milk and a tiny bit of vanilla extract. It should be thick-soupy.

11b. Drizzle on the scone/muffins after you take them out of the oven. Try to eat only one. Then go for a run while the others cool and freeze them.

These babies freeze and thaw marvelously. Seriously, these might be the best things I have ever created.

Enjoy!