Scones Lab660 recipes

Scones Lab · Calculator

Design your own scones

The sliders start at the typical batch: the median of 660 recipes for each ingredient, in grams per 100 g of flour. Move any of them within the range that 90% of recipes use (the 5th to the 95th percentile) and the grams update, with where your choice sits among the recipes and what that ingredient does.

This scales ratios; it is not a tested recipe. Each ingredient moves on its own against the flour, and a combination no recipe uses may not bake the way you expect. For the method, pan and oven, follow the real recipes nearest your numbers.

Flour

250 g, about 2 cups, makes one typical batch.

Start from a recipe

Grams per 100 g of flour

  1. 85 g · 34%about 1/3 cup

    In the middle: 48% of recipes use more, 51% less.

    Cold butter worked into the flour melts into steam pockets: more of it makes a flakier, richer scone.

  2. 130 g · 52%about 1/2 cup

    In the middle: 46% of recipes use more, 53% less.

    Cream, buttermilk or milk; cream-only scones skip the butter and rely on the cream's fat.

  3. 50 g · 20%about 1/4 cup

    In the middle: 45% of recipes use more, 49% less.

    British scones are barely sweet; American bakery scones carry several times the sugar.

  4. 39 g · 16%about 1 large egg

    In the middle: 50% of recipes use more, 49% less.

    Egg makes a richer, more cake-like scone; traditional British ones use none.

  5. 11 g · 4.4%

    In the middle: 46% of recipes use more, 46% less.

    Scones rise on baking powder alone, so they carry about as much as a biscuit; self-rising flour recipes add none.

  6. 2 g · 0.8%

    In the middle: 47% of recipes use more, 43% less.

    Salt keeps a plain scone from tasting floury.

Your scones

Your scones in grams, with approximate volumes
IngredientGrams
Flour250 gabout 2 cups
Butterbutter, oil and shortening85 gabout 1/3 cup
Liquidmilk, buttermilk, yogurt, cream and water130 gabout 1/2 cup
Sugarwhite sugar, brown sugar, honey and syrups50 gabout 1/4 cup
Eggwhole eggs, yolks and whites39 gabout 1 large egg
Leaveningbaking soda and baking powder11 g
Salt2 g
Total567 g

567 g in all from 250 g of flour, counting only the groups above.

Closest real recipe: Blackberry Scones (bakingamoment.com).

BakeThe median of 589 recipes is 400°F (205°C), most for 14 to 20 minutes at their own size. A bigger or smaller batch, or a different pan, changes the time.

The 3 real recipes nearest your numbers

Measured on butter, liquid, sugar, egg, leavening and salt at once. These are published, tested recipes: follow one for its method, pan and timing, or load its percentages and adjust from there.

  1. 1

    Blackberry Scones · bakingamoment.com

    butter 38% · liquid 53% · sugar 22% · egg 17% · leavening 4% · salt 1%

  2. 2

    Peaches and Cream Scones · bakerbynature.com

    butter 36% · liquid 49% · sugar 24% · egg 16% · leavening 3.9% · salt 1%

  3. 3

    Blueberry Feta Scones · 12tomatoes.com

    butter 36% · liquid 52% · sugar 12% · egg 16% · leavening 4.4% · salt 1%

How the calculator works

Every recipe is reduced to baker's percentages: grams of each ingredient group per 100 g of flour. The starting point is the median of all 660 recipes for each group separately, so no single recipe is exactly the starting batch. Grams are your flour weight times each percentage, rounded to the nearest 5 g above 50 g and the nearest gram or half gram below.

“More than 80% of recipes” counts the recipes with strictly less of that ingredient per gram of flour. The nearest recipes are measured on every ingredient at once, each scaled by how much recipes vary on it, so a wide-ranging ingredient does not outweigh a narrow one.

Only the groups listed are counted. Vanilla, spices, mix-ins and toppings are left out unless they have their own slider. Volumes are approximate: flour at 125 g a cup, sugar 200 g, butter or oil 225 g, milk and other liquids 240 g, a large egg 50 g.