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These banana scones have all the warmth and butteriness you love of banana bread, packed into a tender buttermilk scone. And while fresh bananas are required for a great banana bread, they aren’t ideal for banana scones. Instead, freeze dried bananas are the move here. Grind freeze dried bananas into a flour and use in place of some of the flour and sugar. The ground freeze dried bananas add loads of flavor without adding moisture which keeps the scones tender, and buttery, not dense or gluey.
Developing a Banana Scone Recipe
I’ve gone around and around testing this recipe more than 7 times. Every time I thought I’d nailed the recipe, I’d get taster feedback that the banana flavor wasn’t pronounced enough. So more banana would go in, the flour amount would be adjusted, and so on and so forth.
I initially started with ⅓ cup freeze dried bananas, thinking they’re fairly potent in flavor and that would be enough. Well, the final recipe has TWO cups of freeze dried bananas in it. So there’s no mistaking these are banana.
My goal was to create a banana bread flavored scone. So the banana piece was just the first step. I needed to find a way to add warmth and depth.
My go-to buttermilk scone recipe uses grated frozen butter, but for this recipe, browned butter is key for adding that cozy warmth.
Browned butter acts completely different than grated butter, so between that and the freeze dried banana, tweaking and honing the recipe to achieve the right texture took time. Luckily, the result is a recipe that’s very easy. No folding necessary. Just mix the dough together, form, cut, and bake!
How To Make Banana Scones
- Brown the butter in a stainless steel skillet. Pour the browned butter into a parchment-lined quarter sheet pan and freeze until solid. This step makes it so easy to eventually incorporate the butter into the dough.
- Grind the freeze dried bananas into a powder. I’ve found the best way to grind freeze dried bananas into a powder is to use a small food processor. I’ve used this mini food processor in many test kitchens and have personally used it for years. But I’ve also been liking this new cordless processor from KitchenAid.
- Work the browned butter into the dry ingredients by first peeling it off the parchment paper. Break the butter into pieces then add it to the flour mixture and work it in using a pastry blender. You’re looking for pea-sized pieces of butter.
- Mix the dough together by adding cold buttermilk and vanilla bean paste (this is my favorite VB paste). The dough should be both sticky and shaggy.
- Form the dough into a rectangle, chill, then cut into squares.
- Brush each scone with melted butter and sprinkle with more ground bananas and sugar. Bake until deeply golden brown.
Tips for Browning Butter
- Use room temperature butter, or at least butter that isn’t too cold. If frozen butter is used, there’s a risk of uneven browning (and it may splatter).
- Frequently swirl/stir the butter around so the milk solids brown evenly and so they don’t stick to the pan. If the solids do end up sticking to the pan, use a very firm metal spatula and scrape the solids off the pan and add to the butter.
- Watch the butter closely as you brown it! The butter can go from lightly browned to burnt in a matter of seconds. Once the butter becomes golden brown, immediately turn off heat and continue swirling the pan over the still-warm burner, the residual heat will continue to brown the solids, and it gives you more control over the speed of browning. Once the solids are deep golden brown, immediately pour into the prepared pan.
Browned Butter Banana Scones
Description
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Ingredients
- 10 tablespoons frozen unsalted butter divided
- 2 cups (88g) freeze dried bananas
- 1½ cups (187g) all purpose flour
- ⅓ cup (67g) granulated sugar + more for topping
- 1 tablespoon (14g) baking powder
- ½ teaspoon (3g) kosher salt
- ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon dried ground ginger
- ½ cup (55g) chopped toasted pecans
- ¾ cup (173g) buttermilk
- ¾ teaspoon vanilla bean paste
Instructions
- Line a quarter sheet pan with parchment, leaving a 1 inch overhang.
- Heat 8 tablespoons butter in a skillet over medium heat until melted, about 2 minutes. The butter will bubble and splatter, continue cooking, swirling or stirring with a rubber spatula, until butter starts to turn golden, 2–4 minutes. Turn off heat and continue cooking over warm (but off!) burner until deeply golden and has a nutty aroma, about 1 more minute.
- Immediately pour butter into prepared sheet pan, scraping to get all browned milk solids; freeze until solid, about 45 minutes.
- Grind 2 cups (88g) freeze dried bananas into a powder in a food processor. Measure out 1 tablespoon (7g) for the topping, cover and set aside.
- In a mixing bowl, combine remaining ground banana (81g), 1½ cups (187 g) all-purpose flour, ⅓ cup (67g) sugar, 1 tablespoon (14g) baking powder, ½ teaspoon salt, ½ teaspoon cinnamon, and ½ teaspoon ginger.
- Remove browned butter from freezer, peel off parchment, then chop and add to flour. Using a pastry blender, cut butter into flour until pea-sized. Stir in ½ cup (55g) pecans.
- In a liquid measuring cup, stir together ¾ cup (173g) buttermilk and ¾ teaspoon vanilla bean paste. Form a well in center of flour butter-mixture; buttermilk mixture in and, using a rubber spatula, mix until a dough comes together.
- Transfer dough to a piece of parchment and lightly press / fold into a 8✕5-inch rectangle (about 1-inch thick); transfer to fridge until edges are firm, about 1 hour.
- Meanwhile, heat oven to 400ºF (204ºC) with rack set in middle position.
- Melt remaining 2 tablespoons butter in a heatproof bowl in the microwave. Combine reserved 1 tablespoon ground bananas and 1 tablespoon granulated sugar for topping.
- Cut biscuit dough in half lengthwise then cut each half into 4 squares. Flip the dough over, peel off parchment, then transfer scones to a parchment lined backing sheet.
- Brush biscuits with melted butter then sprinkle with banana-sugar topping.
- Bake until risen and golden brown on tops and sides, 15-17 minutes, rotating halfway through. Let cool on sheet 5 minutes. Then transfer to a cooling rack.
