a little something to go with your tea: lemon poppy seed and orange star-anise scones

a word of warning: these scones are addictive! so make sure you invite some friends over for a tea party or else you may just eat too many yourself.  not that this would be the end of the world, of course, but i generally try to encourage healthy eating habits so this would not be such a good thing.   

see, i used to NEVER bake, precisely because i wanted to avoid temptation of eating too many baked goods.  why do that to yourself? why mess with the powers of a baked treat while you are trying to eat very well?  but i developed a strategy: (1) i now only bake when i expect company who will help make the fruits of my labour disappear quickly (or i give them away), and (2) i try to bake only really healthy treats.

here is a recipe for some vegan scones which more-or-less meet the latter criteria (i'll let you take care of the former).
the recipe i found online promised to be "very forgiving", so, as usual, i modified it a bit...  aside from reducing the sugar and the fat, i also decided to play a little with the flavours.  the original was for lemon-poppy seed scones (yum!), but i had an orange sitting around so i halved the original recipe and also made some orange-star anise ones.  both kinds were delicious but were more like cookies than scones. also,  as i expected, the lemon-poppy seed were everyone's favourite.  i think the orange star-anise ones could be a real hit with a little fresh or dry rosemary or thyme ... or even dark chocolate. they just needed that extra something and i think these aromatic herbs would do just that.  i'll try it next time.  i hope you enjoy them!

lemon poppy seed scones 
makes approx 12 scones

2 cups spelt flour
1/2 cup brown sugar (i used coconut sugar which has really low GI index)
4t baking powder
1/2 t salt
2T poppy seeds
juice and zest of 1 lemon
1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk
a little water
1/2 cup earth balance (vegan margarine)

sift the flour, baking powder, salt, sugar and the poppy seeds together.  cut the vegan margarine into the flour in batches until you get a crumbly consistency.  mix the wet ingredients (almond milk and juice of the lemon) and the zest together) and slowly add to the dry mix.  you may need to add a little water as well.  the batter should be moist but should stick together (like cookie dough). 

with a spoon, place the batter onto a greased baking sheet in 2 batches (of 6) to give the scones plenty of room to raise. bake in a pre-heated oven at 400F for 10-15mins or until golden.

and for the orange-star anise scones

follow the same guidelines, but:
instead the lemon, use zest and juice of 1 small orange;
1T of star anise (or 4-5 stars) (simmer the almond milk with the star-anise for a few minutes, turn off and let steep for another 5-10mins to get the star-anise flavour.  note that some of the milk may evaporate so you may want to start with a little more than 1/2 cup, or simply add a little water to the 1/2 cup that you start with).  
you won't need the poppy seeds for these, but as i suggested, you may want to try a little rosemary or thyme - 1T.

ps: these aren't very sweet, which is my preference, but you can always adjust the sugar. the original recipe asked for 3/4 cups of sugar and 3/4 cups of margarine and i cut both by 1/4 cup, which explains why they were not that sweet.  but also, keep in mind that the coconut sugar that i used is not as sweet as regular brown sugar.