Baking scones can be a really fun and rewarding thing to do, but if something goes wrong, it can leave you feeling confused. If you’re reading this article, you’ve probably realized that your scones are hard and dry, and are wondering why this could be.
Scones can be hard for a variety of reasons. Usually, it has to do with the initial dough and how it was made. The temperature of the ingredients that were used, how much the dough was kneaded, and how much milk that was added can all play key roles in the texture of your scones. How you store your scones can also determine their texture after a few days.
In the rest of this article, we will take a look at these reasons more closely and give you tips on how to make your scones softer. Let’s get into it!
Reasons For Hard Scones
Now that we’ve looked at a brief overview of why your scones might be too hard, let’s go deeper into these reasons so that you can have an easier time troubleshooting.
Using Too Much Milk
If you were following a recipe, this might not be an issue for you. Still, if it was a bad recipe or if you accidentally added too much milk, it could have a negative effect on your scones. Furthermore, if you were going off memory or creating your own batch, this issue is even more possible.
Milk is used to make the scones come out flaky and soft, but you have to add just the right amount for it to work. You want the dough to stick together and knead well, but you don’t want it to get overly sticky or wet. Adding too much milk can make the scones tough, hard, and chewy.
Over Kneading The Dough
Overworking the dough is definitely one of the most common culprits when it comes to hard scones. While kneading is necessary for a good scone, it’s very easy to cross that line from the perfect amount to too much. If you’ve kneaded the dough for longer than necessary, it can make the scones hard and chewy once they are baked.
It can be hard to find the right place to stop when kneading, especially if you are a beginner. For scones, you should really only be kneading for about 30 seconds. You just want to make sure that the dough is no longer sticky, but it will still have some lumpy spots—this is completely normal and expected for scones.
Using Warm Or Room Temperature Ingredients
Though a lot of baking recipes will often recommend melting or softening things like butter, this actually isn’t the case when it comes to scones. With scones, it’s best if all of the ingredients are chilled when you start making the dough. If you want to go the extra mile, you can even chill the dough before baking.
Cold ingredients should be used for scone dough because this helps prevent the butter from melting. If the butter melts before the scones are baked, it can make them have a tough and chewy texture when they are done. Chilling the ingredients helps ensure that your scones will be flaky and soft.
Improper Storage
If your scones were soft and flaky when they came out of the oven but have gotten hard over time, this is probably as a result of improper storage. Though, admittedly, it is hard to keep scones from drying out regardless of how they are stored. Still, taking care to store them as well as possible will help them dry out less.
The best way to store scones is to place them in a dish and put foil or plastic wrap tightly over the top. This will help shield them from the air and keep them moist for as long as possible. You could also store them in a plastic bag or airtight container instead.
How Can You Make Your Scones Soft Again?
If an issue occurred during the baking process that made your scones hard, there isn’t going to be much you can do to fix it. All you can really do in this case is take note of what went wrong and try to fix it next time.
Whether you added too much milk, used warm ingredients, or kneaded the dough too much, you’ll just have to problem solve with your next batch of scones.
But if your scones have just hardened over the past few days after baking them, you can try heating them up in a microwave. For this method, just place your scone on a microwave safe plate and cover it with a damp paper towel. This will help distribute moisture into the scone as it heats up.
Warm the scone up at 50% heat, checking it every 10 seconds to see how it’s looking. After you think it’s heated all the way through, take it out and test to see if it’s moistened up. This method doesn’t always work, but it can’t hurt to try! Keep in mind that if you are heating the scone for too long, it might get even more hard.
Alas, if the microwave method doesn’t work, there’s not much you can do about a dry scone. The best way is to just cover it up with something like jam or honey. This way, there is something moist on your scone that can hopefully help distract from the dry texture.
Final Thoughts
There are going to be multiple reasons why your scones are hard, and most of them are things that occur during the baking process. Things like over kneading, adding too much milk, and not using cold ingredients are all common culprits of dried out scones.
If you think that you’ve messed up your scones and made them tough, don’t be too hard on yourself. Baking scones isn’t easy, and it takes time to master the skill. At least now you might know what went wrong, and you can solve the issue next time you’re up for baking scones!