I love scones. I love them fresh out of the oven so they’re hot and crumbly  and with a little smidgen of butter in the middle. Something about them is so rustic, and homey. Scones always bring back fond memories for me involving friends and tea dates. As a matter of fact, I met my best friends over scones and herbal tea. In honor of friends and home baking, I present you with a  pepper, rosemary and cheese scone.

Generally, I’m quite content with just cheese and rosemary, however, my live-in beau is obsessed with pepper. He eats french fries with his pepper and douses many dishes with pepper. I used to be moderately insulted when coated my cooking in pepper but I’m over it now. He just really likes pepper. Probably the same way I like mustard – which is a whole other story. I was inspired by the scones I saw on Ezra Pound Cake, run by Rebecca, which were initially adapted from Rebecca Rather’s book The Pastry Queen. They are a pepper, bacon and cheese concoction. The only limitation is that I don’t eat bacon… obviously not in my vegetarian life, and not once in my meat-eating life. Granted, the boy does eat bacon I was not going to any lengths to cook it for him. Also, the recipe in The Pastry Queen called for too many ingredients and I didn’t even feel like attempting it. Personally, I imagine scones to be very, very simple and still delicious at the same time so I use a recipes from The Foreign Kitchen as the base scone.

Pepper, Rosemary and Cheese Scones 2 cups flour 4 tablespoons baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 4 tablespoons butter (~60 grams), cut into several pieces 1 egg approx. 1/2 cup milk 1 tablespoon sugar 1 1/2  cups + 1/2 cup grated cheese, I used old Cheddar and Montery Jack 2 tablespoons freshly ground pepper 2 tablespoons rosemary, fresh or dried

Preheat oven to 400ºF/ 200ºC. Grease baking sheet.

Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a food processor. Using the dough blade, add the butter and pulse until just combined. The dough will be fairly dry and crumbly at this stage. If all of the dry ingredients are not fully incorporated with the butter, it’s okay.

In a separate bowl, or glass measuring cup, whisk egg with enough milk to make 3/4 cup liquid. The amount of milk depends on the egg. I found that it was approximately 1/2 cup but it completely depends. I used a 2 cup, glass measuring cup from Pyrex so that I could “top up” the egg with milk, to get exactly 3/4 cup. Add sugar and whisk.

Pour egg and milk mixture into the food processor and pulse until incorporated. Transfer dough to a large mixing bowl. Add 1 1/2 cups cheese, pepper and rosemary to the dough in two separate intervals. Mix until everything is incorporated.

On a clean, flat surface flatten the dough out into a circle approximate 8 inches in diameter and 1/2-3/4 inch thick. Cut into 8 pieces. Arrange the scones on a prepared baking sheet. Sprinkle with remaining 1/2 cup cheese. Bake for 15-18 minutes.