When life hands you lemons, make lemon scones. This week should have been a great week for me. I had a birthday, and I love birthdays. I’m not someone who worries about her age, but rather embraces each stage of my life.
Despite the smile and carrot cake, I had a tough week. At times I felt like shaking my fist at God, telling Him that this is not how things are supposed to go. Blaming Him for my hurting. But you can’t do that. You can’t blame God for your disappointments, so I tried to continue to praise Him through my suffering.
While I don’t think it’s wise to turn to food as an emotional outlet, cooking and baking are therapeutic for me. I head to my kitchen when I need to escape the realities around me and just get lost in the ingredients.
So that’s what I did one morning when my little darling woke up at 5:15 AM saying, “I haffa go pee pee, Mommy, I haffa go pee pee”. After taking her to the bathroom she declared, “It’s time to go downstairs.” There were many futile attempts to get her to understand that anything before 7 AM is still the middle of the night, but it was clear she was not going to go back to sleep. So downstairs we went and out came the lemons.
Vegan Lemon Blueberry Scones
- Total Time: 30 minutes
- Yield: 6 large scones 1x
Description
Blueberry Lemon Scones recipe. This is a healthy scone recipe made with whole wheat flour and is also completely vegan. A great breakfast treat!
Ingredients
- 1 tsp apple cider vinegar, plus enough almond milk to equal 1/2 cup
- 1/4 cup agave nectar
- 3 tablespoons coconut oil, melted
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- zest from one lemon
- 1–3/4 cups whole wheat pastry flour
- 1–1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1/2–3/4 cup fresh or frozen blueberries (I used wild frozen)
- 2 tablespoons almond milk
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper or spray with non-stick cooking spray.
- In a liquid measuring cup, mix together the vinegar and almond milk. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Whisk together well and set aside.
- In a small bowl, combine the vinegar-milk mixture, agave nectar, oil, and vanilla; whisk to blend well, then stir in the lemon zest. Pour the wet ingredients over the dry and stir to mix well, but don’t over mix.
- The dough will be thick and sticky.
- Carefully fold in the blueberries. I used 3/4 cup because I used frozen wild blueberries, which are smaller than regular blueberries. If you use larger blueberries, you may want to use closer to 1/2 cup, depending on how full of blueberries you like your scones.
- Using a large ice cream scoop or 1/3 cup measuring cup, drop mounds of dough onto the cookie sheet about 2 inches apart. With slightly wet hands, flatten the biscuits slightly.
Mine have a purple tint because I used frozen blueberries. If you don’t want that color, use fresh blueberries instead.- Bake in the preheated oven for 6 minutes, then remove and quickly brush the tops with 2 tablespoons milk, if desired, to create a more golden crust. Rotate the pan and return to the oven for an additional 6-8 minutes, until the edges are golden and tops are just beginning to brown.
- Allow to cool for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely. Store tightly covered in the refrigerator for up to 5 days. May be frozen.
Notes
Adapted from Sweet Freedom
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Category: Breakfast
- Cuisine: American
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 scone
- Calories: 318
- Sugar: 13.1g
- Sodium: 454.1mg
- Fat: 9.3g
- Carbohydrates: 56.5g
- Protein: 6.5g
This was my first time making scones; for some reason I thought they sounded fancy and difficult. These could not be easier, though, and they were absolutely delicious. The lemon flavor just pops and is perfect paired with the blueberries. If you didn’t know, you wouldn’t guess that they are a healthy version of a scone, vegan, without refined sugar, and made with whole wheat flour.
Meghan thought these were a fun treat for breakfast. When she saw them come out of the oven she said, “Oooh, cookies!”
Notice how dark it is outside in this picture? I hope she doesn’t think I’m going to bake for her every time she wakes up at 5:15 AM. Uh oh. I may have started a trend here.
My kitchen therapy worked as I was able to forget about life for a while when I was making these scones. And everything seemed much brighter when I tasted how good they were.
Question: When life hands you lemons, what’s your therapy?
She sounds so precious. What an adorable mom you are to whip up some scones when the wee one is awake at 5:15. 🙂 I’m very sorry you were going through a rough patch. Hopefully as I’m typing this things have gotten better. When life hands me lemons I really try to find the silver lining. I don’t always make lemonade…sometimes just a homemade cleaning spray. Use those lemons to wipe out the germ (or bad stuff) Thinking about you!
Made these today! Delicious as always…how much lemon zest?
I used the zest from one lemon. I didn’t measure the exact amount. I have tried to update the recipe twice now; I’m not sure why it’s not showing up! I’m glad you enjoyed the scones. 🙂
Thank you, Maryea!
Happy Birthday!
Can you please tell me how much lemon zest is needed? I made the scones tonight and I decided to add1 tbsp of lemon zest. They turned out great! Thank you! Next time I will use the right amount of lemon zest.
You should use the zest from one whole lemon. Thanks for letting me know I left that out of the recipe–I fixed it!
Catherine-thank you!
Sorry it has been a rough week…especially being your birthday! My therapy is running or spending time in the mountains. Both calm me so much. And actually, waking up early and being the only one awake can be so refreshing some times! Hope life picks up soon!
Happy belated birthday, Maryea! I can’t wait to try these. Keep the faith. Katie
Thanks, Katie! I hope you enjoy the scones. 🙂
If you mix the dough less and with frozen blueberries the scones won’t be as blue. Add the blues last. It’s really hard not to make them bleed!
Thanks for the tip! 🙂
Sorry you had a rough week! It’s nice that baking can be relaxing and therapeutic. You make beautiful and tasty looking treats!
Sorry you have had a rough week. 🙁 I admire you for your striving to continue to praise God through your suffering, this is never easy to do. Praying you have a better week ahead.
Thank you for sharing this awesome recipe with us! I had a question about coconut oil. I have a question regarding coconut oil. I have a jar at home and have used it in some of my baking, but I’m not an avid user of it just yet. Do you have any tips/tricks on how best to store it, melt it, etc? I keep mine in the fridge, is that okay to do?
Hi Amber – I noticed you asking about coconut oil? I love it and use it a lot. It’s fine to store it in the fridge but you don’t actually need to, it’s shelf stable and doesn’t go rancid easily/quickly. When I need some I just put the jar in a bowl of warm water or in the sink or even atop the stove if the oven is on – it’ll melt quickly and I just pour out what I need and then put the jar back in the cupboard and it solidifies again, hope this helps 🙂
I think Catherine pretty much covered it. 🙂 You can melt coconut oil the same way you would melt butter: the stove top or even the microwave if you prefer. I keep mine in the pantry, but the fridge is fine, too.
Happy Birthday and I hope your worries will soon be gone. 🙂
It was my 35th birthday yesterday which I celebrated with my little family (my boyfriend and our 1 1/2 year old daughter), friends and delicious Lebanese food. Our little lady was super tired and cranky throughout the whole dinner but we managed to have a wonderful time anyway.
Happy birthday to you, too! Sounds like a fun birthday celebration. 🙂
Lemon and blueberry is one of my fave flavor combos. Sorry it has been a rough week! Hope it gets better and you get some time to recoup this weekend. : )
I am so sorry to hear you are going through a rough time. I hope things will get better soon. I am thinking of you and wishing you happier days.
Happy Birthday!
Trust in the Lord, he will see you through. After all, he did give you the baking talent to help with stress relief 🙂
Happy Birthday, Maryea! I ‘m sorry things have been tough for you lately. I’ve always loved this quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson, which I say to myself often, “Every wall is a door.” When I am going through a rough time I find that spending one on one time with my kids helps a lot. That and meditative yoga.
I love scones, I love lemon scones, I love blueberry scones, I know I will love these. Must. Make. Right. Now.
I’m new to your blog, I found it while looking for ideas for tasty healthy foods for my still bf-ing 17 month old 🙂 I am really enjoying your posts and have learned a lot already about ways to cook/bake vegan – I’ve been pretty limited in my repertoire thus far : So thanks so much for sharing!
I can’t wait until getting up at 530 or 6 means I can actually do baking 🙂 at this point early mornings require lots of hands on attention (books coloring dancing) my little one is notorious for saying mum-mum and pointing to the front room at 545am
Awww, enjoy your moments with breastfeeding. I miss those days. 🙂
Sometimes we are tested to make us stronger and to think about what is important. Whatever is going on, have faith that you will get through it. In the meantime, know that your bloggers (including me, a new “viewer”) support you and look forward to your posts. 🙂
Thank you so much, Tammy.
So sorry that you’re going through a rough time…but thanks for treating us to this scone recipe. Looks amazing! Hope things get better (or at least happier) soon!
I agree, Maryea, I always head to the kitchen and bake or create something when I’m hurting. It’s my outlet. It works for me. I’ve also found that if I can take a long walk (by myself) and pray that works, too. Sorry to hear that you’ve had a tough week. I’ll say some prayers for you. I hope this helps in some small way. Thanks for the scone recipe. They look delicious and we can’t wait to give them a try. We always have good success with your recipes.
Sorry you are hurting. Cling to your God and His truths. I love that Casting Crowns song “praise you in the storm,” have you heard it?
I’ll send some prayers your way. Maybe even while I’m baking these scones. I love the lemon blueberry combo.
Thank you so much for the prayers, Michelle, I really appreciate it. I’m going to have to look up that Counting Crows song. (I may have heard it, but I’m terrible at knowing the titles of songs!)