Come over for Texting and Meditative Scones

Some Sunday mornings are for contemplation.
And, I've figured out that for me, there is just no better way of doing this than baking scones.

If you know me at all, you know I'm not a baker.

I don't mean that I'm not good at baking.
I really do mean I'm *not* a baker.
Which is why I find baking a perfect meditation - it requires all my attention, for a good chunk of time wherein I have just enough space for sorting out the knots in my mental fur.


At any given point, there's no real dearth of said knots.
But, over the last week, specifically, this whole slew of developments within the Academy and responses to these developments: Here, and here, for instance - have caused particularly ugly, academia-related knots to surface on my otherwise ripple-free coat (okay, I really should stop with this metaphor now). Reading articles, comments, status messages and posts about the state of universities and higher education in particular and have started to tear at my resolve to put off thinking about my relationship with The Academe while I'm on a break this summer and the next semester.

The tipping point, I think, was reading the Poor Baker's recipe for the "Terribly Inefficient" Blueberry Pie

Which is why, this morning, more than most, I needed a good solid meditation.
I picked up the last two apples lying in my fruit bowl, grabbed a bunch of new recipes I'd been reading, raided my pantry and decided to bake me some apple scones.


The Constraints: Because of the very dear family chez-moi, I'm still trying to do egg-free baked yummies. I  came upon this blog (that I've never read before) while looking for egg-free apple cake recipes. Her recipe made me think of baking scones instead (since I don't altogether trust egg-free cake - or my ability to make an edible egg-free cake).


The Sources: If you've been reading you know that I rather love and admire the Real Baker's talent for awesomeness (and not just at baking, either). The method and body for this recipe come from her recipe for scones. 
The apple portion of the recipe comes from the Smitten Kitchen's Apple Cake. 
Everything else is, uh, inspired (Ahem!).

This recipe is complete jugaad - so feel free, if you're trying it, to modify as you will.

The Ingredients
2 cups of flour (I've used bread flour with success)
1¼ cup of sugar (divided  ½ cup for apples and the rest for the batter)

1 apple (or two, if you like more crunchy goodness)
1 tsp cinnamon
2½ tsps Vanilla essence (Yeahhh, I don't stock any kind of essences - my fix it was to use Weikfield's Custard Powder)

½ tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
6 T butter (I used 4T unsalted and 3T salted, because I wasn't sure if I'd oversalt otherwise)
1 cup of yogurt (I used slightly soured yogurt - because, again that's the only thing I have on hand)
A fistful of raisins
A few chocolate chips (I used a few dark-chocolate covered pomegranate pieces, because that's what I had on hand. These, here.)

Preheat the oven to 375F.
Cut the apple into little pieces. (I had a small bowl full of unevenly sized apple-bits, not chunks, bits). Mix in the cinnamon,  ½ cup for the sugar and set this aside.

Next, mix the flour, sugar, salt, Weikfield's custard powder, baking soda and baking powder. 
(If you're adding liquid vanilla essence, I'd add it after the butter.) 
Cut in the cold butter into this mix until you have coarse crumbs (I vouch for the Poor Baker's trick of  keeping the butter as cold as possible, so keep it in the fridge right up until you use it - this really does make for the most delicious scones).


Stir in the apple mix. Throw in the raisins and chocolate chips. Add the yogurt.
Turn the mix onto a floured surface and roughly knead a few times. Don't overwork the dough - I like to keep the dough kind of crumbly, but still soft enough that it will hold shape.

I work the dough into little triangular scones by hand.

Put the scones on a tray lined with parchment paper and bake for 15-18 minutes.
Take out and let cool.

I like these (apple-cinnamon) scones slightly warm and they taste pretty good right out of the oven. 

And as for the meditation, does this exercise really work? Well, I'm still wondering whether staying in the theoretical humanities is right for me. I'm still seriously re-thinking my decision to stay in academia and wondering if I should go back to working full-time outside the academy. 
But, I'm a hundred percent with not trying to turn the Academy into a profit-churning machine.
So there's that.