When I was younger, I was always willing to bake cookies upon request, muffins for morning road-trip breakfast and the odd family meal when my mother was pregnant with my sister and couldn’t stomach the sight and smell of raw meat. Being in the kitchen at a young age was a learning experience for me and there were a lot of trial and error periods. Such as learning the difference between teaspoons and tablespoons when it came to measuring salt in chocolate chip cookies. Or figuring out the right pan size so that our lasagna would come out in four layers instead of two (resulting in a delicious, but very flat lasagna). The biggest learning experience though, and one that I still struggle with today, is learning about what flavours work together.

I can remember one time where I almost used olive oil in a boxed brownie recipe. My mom caught me mid-measurement and taught me a lesson I’ve never forgotten: “olive oil is not for baking.” This is something I’ve carried with me still to this day, and may explain why I currently own three (yes, three) bottles of extra virgin olive oil in my kitchen pantry. Although I love pairing a good olive oil with a loaf of fresh bread (which may also explain my collection of balsamic vinegars too), I was always a little bummed out that I couldn’t use any of it for baking. That is, until I recently started doing a little research and realized that it was not so much avoiding the use of olive oil in baking, but finding the best flavour pairing that goes with it.

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It’s amazing how the weather can affect one’s mood. The off-and-on winter/spring weather has been frustrating enough, but nothing dampens my spirits more than waking up in the morning, looking out the window and seeing nothing but grey skies. No sun, no rain, just bleak, somber skies. Even though it’s Good Friday and we have no intentions of doing a lot today, it’s sort of off putting.

So naturally, after I was greeted by grey skies this morning, I knew I had to bake something special for breakfast and these skor toffee scones were just the answer. I splurged and used cake flour in place of some of the flour and butter in place of my usual margarine. Instead of sugar, I substituted pure maple syrup. Right before I baked the scones though, I brushed them with a bit of milk and sprinkled a little brown sugar. I’m pretty sure that last part is the secret to all scone-making because the result was flaky, savoury scones with a delicious crunchy sugar top. Sometimes I can’t believe that in the three years I’ve been blogging, I only have six scone recipes. Note to self – make scones more often.

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