When bananas get overripe you bake banana bread and when you want something gluten free you bake a round loaf for buckwheat banana scones. Scones are similar to quick bread, a little dense and dry than a bread and a little moist than a biscuit. I have loads of buckwheat that needs to be used up soon so baking this buckwheat banana scones was an effort to do just that. The scones were a good idea because I have just too many little jars of home made fruit preserves that I keep making now and then. We liked these scones with pomegranate and rhododendron jelly but orange marmalade, plum jam, strawberry jam or mulberry jam will be as good.
It has been long time since I baked something for week day breakfasts, all baking I did for the recipe trials of the products I develop and that kind of work almost killed my desire to bake anymore for the two of us. And when I decided to bake this loaf for the scones I was reminded of the cinnamon chocolate chips Deeba had gifted me long time back. These were lying unused since I was not baking for ourselves at all, a little because of all the travel I did and also because I was just too busy with work. The cinnamon chocolate chips are a burst of flavours on the palate, I had never imagined these will be so good, even for someone who is not too fond of chocolate.
The rich cinnamon chocolate chips added a beautiful depth of flavours to the scones, I added some flax seeds to make the scones softer as buckwheat tends to get a little dry when baked. Baking with buckwheat flour gives better results when banana and flax seeds are used if not eggs.
ingredients
(for 8 medium sized scones)
buckwheat flour 220 gm (I ground buckwheat groats in mixie)
baking soda 1/2 tsp
butter 60 gm
banana 140 gm (2 medium bananas)
flax seeds powder 40 gm
chocolate chips 50 gm
mixed nuts chopped 50 gm ( I used almonds and walnuts)
salt 2 gm
procedure
Mix baking soda with buckwheat flour and sieve a few times to mix well. Add cubes of cold butter and rub to make it look like breadcrumbs. Or run through a food processor to get this.
Now mash the bananas and mix with flax seeds meal. Add this to the flour mix and add the chopped nuts and chocolate chips. Take care if the chocolate chips are kept at room temperature in Indian summers, it may disintegrate in the dough, so refrigerate for better result.
Mix to make a tacky dough, the dough is very soft and sticks to fingers.
Prepare a baking tray lined with baking sheet. Make a loose ball of the whole dough and slap it on the baking tray. Flatten with your fingers to make a 2 cm thick round shape. Usually scones are cut into wedges at this time but since this dough is too sticky, we will do it after the baking is done.
Bake this round disc at 180C in preheated oven for 40 minutes. Check with a skewer and bake a little more if required. The surface gets a few pinkish brown patches this way, if you brown it a bit more it gets a little dry after baking. Buckwheat flour behaves a lot differently than regular flour.
Let the disc cool in the baking tray, it might break if you try to transfer on a wire rack while still hot.
Cut into wedges when cool and store refrigerated. Reheat and serve with honey or fruit preserves. The scones are not sweet even though there is banana in it, the flax seeds and buckwheat almost absorb all the sweetness of bananas. I would still recommend not using any sugar in the recipe, you can always slap on as much fruit preserve or honey as you want.
It makes a filling breakfast with milk or juice if you wish. I rarely eat sweet kind of breakfast and I did not eat these too. I am more into 'idli steamed in my bowl' these days, I need my kick of spices and salt to start the day. The same buckwheat is being used to make my idli too, it takes just 2 minutes to steam in the microwave when I have the batter ready. Will share that too soon.
But these scones and any such muffins/breakfast cakes or quick breads make my mornings more organised as I don't have to worry about making a separate breakfast for the husband. He loves anything that is slathered with honey or fruit preserves.
These scones are perfect with a cup of tea or coffee as well. Served with either clotted cream or fruit preserve it could be a mini meal or snack any time of the day.
I am planning to bake savoury scones with buckwheat. I have some nice herbs growing in the garden and some yellow cherry tomatoes too. It would be great if I could use some of these to bake some nice scones or muffins using these.
Till then bake some buckwheat banana scones.
I have been getting queries about where to get buckwheat in India. My first choice is Down to Earth for whole buckwheat and buckwheat flour but you do get buckwheat in khari baoli market (old Delhi) too and some grocery stores stock too. Although the availability of buckwheat is better during Navratri days as this is a fasting food.
This buckwheat banana scones recipe is also a fasting compatible recipe and can be consumed during navratri fasting. I have always considered that Navratri fasting was devised for healthy living and detoxing the body twice a year.
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