Mini Glazed Orange Scones

Mini Glazed Orange Scones

These Mini Glazed Orange Scones sort of happened by accident. I'd intended to make some Mini Cranberry Orange Scones, but I forgot to add the cranberries. The first batch of these got a vanilla glaze, but I didn't enjoy those so much. The orange flavor in the scone didn't stand up well to the strong vanilla flavor in the glaze. I'd frozen a few of the unbaked scones to see how that would work out, which it did, very well (Thank you, Martha Stewart). I made a simple orange glaze and voila! They turned out fabulous. Buttery, sweet, and crisp on the outside; tender sweet orange flavored in the middle. I still think I prefer the version with cranberries, but these are a close second.

Mini Glazed Orange Scones

Ingredients:

• 3 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
• 1/3 cup sugar (rounded)
• 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon grated orange peel
• 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) chilled butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1 tablespoon orange extract
• 1 cup half & half

Glaze Ingredients*:

• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 3-4 tablespoons milk
• 1/2 teaspoon orange extract
• tiny amount of orange food coloring (or yellow and red mixed)

Instructions:
Preheat oven to 400°F. Line 3 baking sheets with parchment paper. (Parchment isn’t necessary, but it helps.)  
Sift flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and baking soda into large bowl. (By "sift" I mean put the ingredients in a large bowl and stir well with a whisk.) Mix in orange peel. 
Add butter and rub in with fingertips, or cut in with a pastry blender, until mixture resembles coarse meal. 
Measure half & half into glass measuring cup and add orange extract.   Add half & half, tossing with fork until moist clumps form. Turn dough out onto lightly floured work surface. Knead briefly to bind dough, about 4 turns. 
Cut ball of dough in half.  Form dough into 2, 1-inch-thick rounds. Cut into 6 wedges each. Then cut each of those wedges into four wedges. Transfer wedges to prepared baking sheets, spacing 1 1/2 inches apart. (Or you can place unbaked scone wedges onto a wax paper lined sheet pan and freeze until hard. Once frozen, transfer scones to zip-top freezer bags until ready to bake. Then bake as directed below.) 
You should be able to fit 16 on each sheet. Place two sheets in the refrigerator while you work with the first. 
Bake at 400°F until tops of scones are golden brown, about 10-12 minutes. 
While scones bake, mix the glaze ingredients until smooth, cover, and set aside.
When scones are cool enough to pick up, dip the top of each one into the glaze, and then place bottom down on a serving plate. If you want to make sure they don't stick, you can place glazed scones on the cooling rack until glaze is set, and then transfer to a serving plate.

Makes 48 mini scones

*I suppose you could switch orange juice for the milk and skip the food color for the glaze, but I didn't have any orange juice to give it a try.

Hopefully you get the gist of how to cut these mini sized.