Lemon Lime Lavender Scones by Lucy Burdette #giveaway

 

LUCY BURDETTE: Since we've arrived at the end of April, I think it's safe to start talking about Key West food critic mystery #16, A DELICIOUS DECEPTION (coming July 14.) 

Hayley Snow’s mother Janet has a bustling catering business in Key West, and these days, she gets lots of wedding and wedding-adjacent party requests. In this 16th book, she’s catering a wedding with a lavender and lemon theme. (Really? In Key West in November?) She made these scones as a practice run and offers one to Hayley with tea at a fraught moment. This would also be a lovely addition to a Mother's Day brunch, or really any special occasion. To celebrate spring and mothers and mother figures and a new book coming in July, I'll be giving away a copy of the new paperback edition of A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS, coming from Worldwide Mystery. Leave a comment here, but also join my mailing list for an extra chance to win!

PS Before baking, I looked at recipes on Sally’s Baking Addiction and Fork in the Kitchen for inspiration. The lime was added at the last moment when I realized I was short a lemon.

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour plus more for sprinkling

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 and 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

2 teaspoons dried culinary lavender

zest of one lemon and one lime

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup (8 Tbsp) unsalted butter, frozen

1/2 cup heavy cream, plus 2 tablespoons for brushing

1 large egg

1 and 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

optional: coarse sugar for topping

Preheat the oven to 400.

Zest the lemon and lime and rub the zest into the sugar with your fingers. Whisk the lemon-lime sugar together with the baking powder, salt, and flour. Add two teaspoons, more or less to taste, of culinary lavender. Set this aside. (I used one teaspoon because I didn’t know how much I’d like the taste—it was very mild.)

Grate the frozen butter with a box grater and mix this into the dry ingredients. (The secret to light scones is cold ingredients.) Whisk together the cream, the egg, and the vanilla. Pour the wet ingredients over the dry and mix lightly. 

Scrape the batter onto a surface covered with parchment paper and a bit of flour. With floured hands, shape the dough into a ball and press the ball flat. Cut the disk of dough into triangles. Move the scones to your freezer for 15 minutes, then brush with additional cream. 

Bake for about 20 minutes (depending on size) until lightly brown on top. Cool the scones before icing. 

Lemon Lavender Icing

4 tablespoons heavy cream

1 teaspoon dried culinary lavender

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1 and 1/4 cups confectioners’ sugar

Heat the cream to a simmer. Remove from heat and add the lavender to steep for fifteen minutes. Strain the lavender out of the milk and add the lemon juice. Whisk in the confectioner’s sugar to desired thickness. Frost the scones and enjoy!

USA Today bestselling author Lucy Burdette writes the Key West food critic mystery series including A POISONOUS PALATE and A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS. Join her mailing list right here.

Coming July 14--isn't it gorgeous?

Book 15 in the Key West series, THE MANGO MURDERS, is in bookstores now!

The trade paperback edition of A POISONOUS PALATE is out now! 

And the trade paperback edition of A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS is out now!

Michael Ruhlman's Sour Orange Daiquiri

 

Ann Hood with Lucy and Elise Hart Kipness

LUCY BURDETTE: I am reading Ann Hood‘s memoir called Fly Girl this week, which is the story of her time as a flight attendant. She’s such a good writer she can make any subject interesting! But that’s a side note to say, we had Ann and her lovely husband, the food writer, Michael Ruhlman visiting Key West last February as part of our Friends of the Key West library speaker series. We also asked him if he would prepare a special cocktail for our major donor party. This is what he made! It was delicious and went down oh so easily. (Which will explain my dirth of photos...)

Michal Ruhlman's Sour Orange Daiquiri

2 ounces white rum

1/2 ounce lime juice

1/4 ounce orange juice 3⁄4 ounce

3/4 ounce simple syrup

1 orange twist

Combine the rum, lime juice, orange juice, and simple syrup in a mixing glass, add ice, and shake until chilled. Strain into a chilled coupe or an old-fashioned glass over ice. Garnish with the orange twist.

USA Today bestselling author Lucy Burdette writes the Key West food critic mystery series including A POISONOUS PALATE and A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS. Join her mailing list right here.

Coming July 14--isn't it gorgeous?

Book 15 in the Key West series, THE MANGO MURDERS, is in bookstores now!

The trade paperback edition of A POISONOUS PALATE is out now! 

And the trade paperback edition of A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS is out now!

Double Cheddar Drop Biscuits with Everything Bagel Topping by Lucy Burdette

LUCY BURDETTE: I had been admiring a recipe for Cheddar Bay Biscuits on the website spoon fork bacon, meaning to make it. They looked very good, but I wondered if it would be too much garlic and not enough cheese flavor? (Besides, I needed to start using my special purchases from King Arthur Baking Company, i.e. better cheddar cheese powder and everything bagel topping.) So I tweaked and here’s how mine came out. By the way,  I cut down the butter from 12 oz to 8, and that was plenty! You could skip the cheddar powder if it’s not available and they would still be good.

Ingredients

2 cups, all purpose flour

1 tablespoon cornstarch

1 tablespoon baking powder

2 teaspoons garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon salt.

1 tablespoon better cheddar powder

5 ounces a.k.a. one and a quarter cups shredded cheddar cheese

8 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

One cup of buttermilk or one cup milk with a splash of vinegar.

Preheat the oven to 450.

Combine the dry ingredients and mix well, Then fold in the shredded cheese. Add the melted butter, holding back just enough to paint on the tops. Add the buttermilk or milk and stir lightly until the dry ingredients are incorporated.

Scoop out globs of the biscuit dough (can use an ice cream scoop or two spoons) and drop about 2 inches apart on a baking sheet covered with parchment.

Paint the leftover butter onto the biscuit tops and sprinkle with everything bagel topping. I worried that the bits I spilled would burn but they didn’t.

Bake for 10 to 12 minutes until the tops are browning. Serve with the soup of your choice! For us, this was a delicious lentil soup with lots of veggies. But my gosh, these biscuits, though they didn’t want to be photographed much, were to die for! They are best hot right out of the oven.

USA Today bestselling author Lucy Burdette writes the Key West food critic mystery series including A POISONOUS PALATE and A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS. Join her mailing list right here.

Coming July 14--isn't it gorgeous?

Book 15 in the Key West series, THE MANGO MURDERS, is in bookstores now!

The trade paperback edition of A POISONOUS PALATE is out now! 

And the trade paperback edition of A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS is out now!

Orange Date Scones by Lucy Burdette

LUCY BURDETTE: Back in 2020 in the days of the pandemic, I made a recipe of banana date scones that was fashioned after an amazing scone that we tasted in Scotland. With this scone, I had been hoping to bring back memories of happier times.  Those months and years were so hard, and we were all trying our best to figure out how to survive! For me, food was a big part of it.

Today’s recipe is another date scone, but it uses yellow Bahri Dates from California, along with orange extract and peel from Penzey’s that I’ve been meaning to try. If you don’t like the idea of so much orange, you could replace the extract with vanilla or even almond. You could also add nuts if you like. You could also add a glaze of confectioner’s sugar and orange juice. I skipped that this time.

The basic scone recipe comes from Sally’s baking addiction, with tweaks from me. She is very definite about using frozen butter that has been grated, and then mixed into the dry ingredients. So that’s what I’ve always done and they turn out well.

Preheat the oven to 400

Ingredients for the scones

2 cups all purpose flour

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon dried orange peel

1/2 cup unsalted butter, frozen

1/2 cup heavy cream or whole milk

One large egg

1 teaspoon orange extract

One cup yellow dates, cut into small pieces

Whisk the dry ingredients together.

Grate the frozen butter into the dry ingredients and mix into pea-sized crumbs.

Whisk together the egg, the cream or milk, and the extract. Pour this over the dry ingredients, followed by the dates. Mix until moist.

Scrape the dough onto a piece of parchment on the counter that has been lightly floured. Flour your hands as well. Mix lightly until it holds together and tap the dough into a circle. Slice the circle into wedges, the size you want to serve.

At this point, you can brush the scones with more cream and sprinkle them with sugar. Transfer the parchment to a plate and freeze them for at least 15 minutes. Move the scones to a baking sheet covered with a clean parchment sheet.

Bake the scones for 22 to 25 minutes until lightly browned.

USA Today bestselling author Lucy Burdette writes the Key West food critic mystery series including A POISONOUS PALATE and A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS. Join her mailing list right here.

Book 15 in the Key West series, THE MANGO MURDERS, is in bookstores now!

The trade paperback edition of A POISONOUS PALATE is out now! 

And the trade paperback edition of A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS is out now!

Janet Snow's Shrimp Fritters by Lucy Burdette

 

LUCY BURDETTE: These are allegedly the shrimp fritters that Hayley’s mother Janet Snow was passing around when the catamaran blew up in the first chapter of The Mango Murders. I cannot vouch for that recipe because she did not share it with me and no one on the cruise was able to taste it! I did the best I could to imagine something similar, and included a mango peach salsa which was delicious. The salsa can also be made with avocados instead of peaches, if it’s not peach season. Either way, fair warning, it’s chunky and would be difficult to eat as a canapé. I’m certain a real caterer would come up with a solution! By the way, both of the jalapeños in the photo are from our garden. I was nervous about using the red, riper version, thinking it might be very hot. NB, it wasn’t too hot and it offered a gorgeous red pop.  

Ingredients for the mango salsa

1 ripe mango, peeled and diced

One ripe peach, peeled and diced

1/2 red onion, finely chopped, optional (I did not choose to add this)

1 jalapeño, seeded and minced (use more or less depending on your desired spice level)

1-3 tablespoons fresh cilantro, chopped

1 lime, juiced

Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

Combine the diced mango, peach, red onion if using, jalapeño, and cilantro in a medium bowl.

Add lime juice, salt, and pepper.

Stir to combine and let rest for 10–15 minutes, or refrigerate for up to 30 minutes, to meld flavors. 

Ingredients for the shrimp fritters

1/2 lb shrimp, peeled, deveined, and coarsely chopped

1/4 cup flour 

1/2 tsp baking powder

1 egg

Splash of Guinness

3 scallions, chopped 

1 jalapeno, minced

corn kernels cut from one ear

Vegetable oil, for frying (I used olive)

Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

Stir together the chopped scallions, chopped jalapeno, corn, and egg. Chop the shrimp and add that. 

Sprinkle the dry ingredients over the shrimp mixture and mix lightly. Splash in a bit of beer.

Heat olive oil in a large frying pan. Drop batter by tablespoonfuls and fry in batches until golden brown, about 3 minutes per side.

Serve with the mango salsa and possibly also cocktail sauce and a wedge of lemon if desired. 

**Meanwhile, here are some deals for you. The ebook edition of A DISH TO DIE FOR is on sale this month for $1.99! 

**The audio editions of THE KEY LIME CRIME and DEATH WITH ALL THE TRIMMINGS are both on sale for $1.99! (Not sure how long this one will last...)

**Finally, after a several month delay, the audio edition of THE MANGO MURDERS is finally available!

USA Today bestselling author Lucy Burdette writes the Key West food critic mystery series including A POISONOUS PALATE and A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS. Join her mailing list right here.

Book 15 in the Key West series, THE MANGO MURDERS, is in bookstores now!

The trade paperback edition of A POISONOUS PALATE is out now! 

And the trade paperback edition of A CLUE IN THE CRUMBS is out now!