Simple But Great

On Monday and Wednesday morning I pack all three of the kids into the car and we take a short drive to put Jordyn on the bus to go to school. I think the kids really like going on this little outing. It will be really fun in the spring when it's warmer and the babies are older and can get out of the car and watch Jordyn get on the bus. Today when we were waiting for the bus, a lady came over to admire the babies and she thought they were twins!

After going to my cooking party on Friday night, I was really in a baking/cooking mood. (It was a party for a fairly new company called "Demarle" - they sell flexible bakeware designed with a combination of woven glass and food grade silicon. Subway, The Cheesecake Factory, and Oprah all use the cookware. It's pretty cool stuff, just very expensive!) So, I decided that I wanted to bake something I've never tried before. I decided to make pumpkin scones! Tom thinks I'm wierd for taking a picture of my food, but I couldn't resist. I'll do anything for something new to blog about! The scones were pretty tasty so I'll include the recipe:

Pumpkin Scones:
2 cups all purpose flour
1/3 cup light or dark brown sugar
1/2 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1/3 cup chopped white chocolate (optional)
1/4 cup toasted and chopped pecans (opt.)
1/3 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup fresh or canned pumpkin
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
Egg Wash:
1 large egg
1 tbp. milk or cream
Turbinado sugar for sprinkling the tops of the scones (opt.)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, spices, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Cut the butter into small pieces and blend into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. Stir in the chopped choc. and pecans. In a seperate bowl, mix together the buttermilk, pumpkin puree and vanilla and then add the buttermilk mixture to the flour mixture. Mix just until the dough comes together. Do not overmix.
Transfer to a lightly floured surface and knead the dough gently 4 or 5 times and then pat the dough into a circle that is about 7 in. round and about 1 1/2 in. thick. Cut this circle in half, then cut each half into 3 triangle shape wedges. Place the scones on the baking sheet and brush the tops with the egg wash and sprinkle with the sugar.
Place the baking sheet inside another baking sheet to prevent the bottoms of the scones from over browning. Bake for about 20 min. or until golden brown. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. ( I melted the leftover white choc. and drizzled it over the tops of the scones.)
Makes 6 scones.