Let’s get to it! A rundown of another stint in New York City. We took an early morning flight and arrived in NYC, just in time for dinner. We headed to one of our favorite spots in the Lower East Side, Kisa. A casual restaurant inspired by taxi driver stops in Korea called Sik Dangs, think roadside diners. It’s Korean soul food, homey, filling, and delicious. The perfect meal to have after sitting on a plane for 6 hours.
First, pick your entree: Bulgogi (beef), Spicy Pork, Squid or Bi Bim Bap. I’m partial to the Bibimbap with Bulgogi. An array of Banchan (little dishes) accompanies every entree. This includes kimchi and a rotating variety of delicious pickled veggies or marinated raw salmon, shrimp, mayak eggs, or steamed eggs. The Banchan is Kisa’s strength, so good. Soup comes with the meal, usually a clear beef and radish soup, the perfect start. Finally, on your way out, grab a cup of black bean latte or hot chocolate from the complimentary vending machine by the door. If this is a typical place in Korea, taxi drivers eat very well 😋
The next morning, we headed to Mary O’s Irish Soda Bread Shop. Mary O’s scones are so good that there is a line out the door every morning. This is the only item on the menu: raisin scones. Each scone is served warm, split down the middle, and filled with a slab of Irish butter and a generous spoonful of homemade blackberry jam. They’re buttery, crispy on the outside, and tender with a nice crumb on the inside. It’s worth the wait on a weekday, which is when you want to go; the wait on weekends can be hella LONG.
Lucky For Me
I don’t have a Mary O’s at home, a real bummer, so I was thrilled to see a copycat recipe for Mary O’s scones appear on Food52. Short of having Goldbelly deliver scones for an outrageous amount of money, this recipe could solve my Mary O’s Scone cravings, and I won’t have to wait in line.
Let’s Make Some Scones
Butter – I use Kerrygold butter. As they say, when in Rome… Kerrygold has a higher fat content and lower moisture content, which means a richer, buttery flavor and a flakier, tender scone. Kerrygold is widely available at TJs, Costco, and most supermarkets. You can substitute it with a European-style butter such as Plugra.
Flour – Mary imports Odlums Flour from Ireland, which you can buy at her shop. I didn’t have the foresight to buy a bag in NYC (don’t laugh, I used to bring back White Lily Flour every time I went to Nashville), so I looked up the ingredient list for Odlums flour. It has a similar protein content to Gold Medal AP flour (~10gms/cup) so my first batch was made using Gold Medal. For curiosity’s sake, I made a batch using King Arthur AP flour, which has a higher protein content (12gm/cup).
The scones made with GM flour were tender, fine crumbed, and crispy on the outside. The scones made with KA flour were also delicious, but they seemed a bit crumblier and drier than the Gold Medal batch. Both are delicious. If you like a more tender, cake-like scone, use Gold Medal. For a more classic scone, use King Arthur flour. Don’t skip the generous slab of butter and a big dollop of jam, especially if you use King Arthur flour.
The Key is in the Process
Get out your muffin tin. Yep, you read that right. Unlike regular scones, these are baked in a muffin tin. There’s a reason for this. Unlike traditional scone recipes, the dough is not formed into a cohesive disc to be cut into wedges. You want the dough to be loose and chunky. Start by coating your butter with the flour mixture. I like to press the butter cubes into flakes and use a pastry cutter to blend and cut the butter into smaller flakes.
Drizzle the buttermilk and cream into the mixture. I use a dough whisk and my hands to stir the liquid into the flour mixture. You will end up with a very loose mixture of clumps of dough and crumbs. Compressing the dough will toughen the scones.
Using a large ice cream scoop, fill each muffin cup, then lightly press the top just enough to get the crumbs to adhere. There will be lots of stragglers or crumbs left. Sprinkle these evenly over each scone. You should have enough dough for 12 scones. Egg wash each scone by liberally dabbing each one with a pastry brush. Bake at 425 for 20-22 minutes. Take the scones out when the tops are a nice, deep golden brown. Yes, they come out looking like muffins. 🤷🏻♀️
To Serve: Pull out your salted Kerrygold butter, split each scone in half vertically, careful not to cut all the way through. Slide a pat of butter in between and top with a generous dollop of jam. My preference is a berry jam, with raspberries, blueberries, and strawberries. My freezer jam recipe is here, or use your favorite jam. Make a cup of Irish or English Tea and enjoy.
Testing with King Arthur Flour was an excuse to make yet another batch of these scones—a lovely way to start the morning.
Check out my Instagram reel on making these scones! https://www.instagram.com/p/DI0vHFORsqB/
Mary O's Irish Soda Bread Scones
Equipment
- 1 std 12-cup muffin tin
- 1 #40 ice cream scoop
Ingredients
Dry Ingredients
- 4 cups all-purpose flour 480 grams
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar 100 grams
- 4 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
Fat
- 3/4 cup unsalted butter, cold and cut into cubes 170 grams (Kerrigold or Plugra)
Add In
- 1 cup raisins
Liquids
- 2/3 cup buttermilk or milk plus 1/2 teaspoon lemon juice
- 2/3 cup heavy cream plus more for egg wash
- 1 egg yolk
Condiments Serve with
- berry jam, your choice
- softened butter (Kerrigold)
- flakey sea salt
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 425 degrees F with a rack placed in the center position. Generously grease a 12-cup muffin tin.
- In a large bowl, stir together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside. Stir together cream and buttermilk in a liquid measuring cup.
- Add the cold, cubed butter to the flour mixture and pinch into the flour with your fingers, creating flakes of flour-coated butter. Work butter into it resembles coarse sand or use a pastry cutter, slice through the flour mixture until it resembles coarse sand and no large butter clumps remain. Do this quickly, as you don't want the butter to have time to soften too much.
- Stir in the raisins, then drizzle in the buttermilk and cream. Use your hands to scoop and fold the dough together until the flour is absorbed, trying to mix and press as little as possible. The dough will be very loose and chunky. Gently scoop the dough into the cupcake tin, evenly dividing between the 12 cups. Pile any loose crumbly bits distributed evenly on top of each tin.
- In a small bowl, mix the egg yolk with 2 tablespoons heavy cream. Brush over each scone. Bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out mostly clean, 22 to 25 minutes. (If using a kitchen thermometer, it should read at least 190 degrees F.)
- Serve warm with jam, butter, and flakey sea salt. Mary makes a delicious blackberry jam. A raspberry jam works well.
Just made these and they are fabulous! Used King Arthur flour and Kerrygold. I made one mod and that was sanding sugar on top. Perfection! I also baked them in bakery style cups so they look professional. 😎. Next time I’ll double the cream/egg wash as it wasn’t too keen to be pastry brushed on (kinda thick) so I spooned it over….and maybe some more raisins. My lovely retired neighbor from Belfast gave these a rave review and told me to forget trying to perfect soda bread and stick to these. Lol.
Thanks! I’m glad they turned out well for you!
We have not been to Mary o’s shop but have heard about her famous scones, so we are happy to have found your recipe and instructions. These scones are delicious! We have only King Arthur all purpose flour, so we switched outa tiny amount of the flour with cornstarch to mimic cake flour or a lower protein level flour. They turned out perfectly tender in the inside but crispy on the outside, best eaten warm, even plain! The egg wash made them look so delectable! We halved the recipe, measured the ingredients with a scale, our dough was wetter unlike your picture. Will make again, thanks!
Thank you! I’m glad they turned out well for you!
If I acquire the Mary O’s flour, do I still use the same dry ingredients? Or does use if the flour mean I need to omit the baking powder or baking soda?
Odlums makes both a self-raising flour and a plain cream flour. Buy the plain flour, follow the recipe as written, including the leavening agents. If you buy the self-raising (aka self-rising) you would omit just the leavening agents, but I’m not sure of the proportions.
Thanks for the recipe. I did a 1/2 recipe and used (dried cranberries) the milk/lemon juice and 1/2 and 1/2 instead of cream. They turned out excellent.
That sounds delish!
Do you know what type of Odiums flour Mary O’s uses? I love your recipe. I thought I would try ordering the Odium flour from Amazon, but they have 3+ types of their flour. Thanks.
The flour on the display shelf at Mary O’s is Odlums Self-Raising Flour, here is the amazon link. https://a.co/d/fiKqIyD. You can doublecheck with Mary O’s. This flour contains the leavening agents. I looked on Odlums’s site and the flour without the raising agents is Odlums Cream Plain Flour in the blue package. Hope this helps!
they use a very specific brand of self rising flour. this cant be a dupe of that recipe
I point that out in my post. They use Odlum’s from Ireland. The best I could do was come close to the protein content of Odlum’s. These may not be Mary O’s but the recipe is pretty darn good. Try it, let me know what you think. 🙂
Just stumbled across your blog while searching a lost scone recipe of Mandy’s scone. During the pandemic I became obsessed with Soda Breads and Scones. Until now I knew nothing of Mary O. I’m fascinated to try this out. I wonder what Darina would say. Tsk tsk
Or embrace Thank You for taking the time to put all of this o line
You’re welcome! I hope you try Mary O’s! Let me know what you think when you do 🙂