Cinnamon-Sugar Scones
These scones are light and tender and packed with so much cinnamon-sugar flavor!
From the moment I flipped open my January issue of the Bake From Scratch magazine and saw these scones on the first page, I have been obsessed. I’ve baked them several times and they are my new favorite. Seriously, I’ve never had scones this good!
They’re stuffed with a flavorful cinnamon filling, sprinkled with cinnamon-sugar before baking, and finished off with a creamy vanilla drizzle. Talk about a “wow-factor”. And these scones have the most incredible texture—so soft, light and buttery. They’re my new go-to treat for when I have house guests (everyone loves them!) or when I need a lazy weekend baking project.
baking tip:Why biscuit and scone ingredients need to stay cold
A key factor in the rise of biscuits and scones, and an even bigger part of their texture, is the little bits of cold butter that melt and make steam as they bake. If the butter is too warm it will incorporate into the dry ingredients and those little pockets of butter and steam will be gone.
For tall, soft, and flaky biscuits and scones, make sure you start with cold butter and milk/buttermilk, and work the dough quickly so the butter doesn’t have a chance to warm up.
Other scone recipes
If you like these cinnamon-sugar scones, you may like these other great scone recipes:
- Lemon Poppy Seed Scones
- Chocolate Orange Ricotta Scones
- Apple Cinnamon Scones
- Lemon Blueberry Scones
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Cinnamon-Sugar Scones
Ingredients
Cinnamon filling:
- ¼ cup all-purpose flour (60 grams)
- 3 tablespoons light or dark brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 2 tablespoons cold unsalted butter , cubed
Scones:
- 2 cups all-purpose flour (240 grams)
- ¼ cup + 1 tablespoon granulated sugar (50 grams), divided
- 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoons salt
- 5 tablespoons cold unsalted butter , cubed
- 1 cup + 1 tablespoon cold heavy cream (250 ml)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 large egg
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
Drizzle:
- 1 cup powdered sugar (114 grams)
- ¼ cup heavy cream (60 ml)
- ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
Make the filling:
- In a bowl combine the flour, brown sugar, and cinnamon. Add the cubed butter and cut it into the dry ingredients with a pastry blender until the mixture resembles coarse sand. If you press some together with your fingers it should clump and hold its shape. Set aside.
Make the scones:
- In a large bowl combine the flour, 1/4 cup of sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add the cubed butter and cut into the dry ingredients until the butter is the size of small peas.
- Add 1 cup of the cold cream and vanilla and mix until the dough starts to come together. Turn the mixture out onto the counter if needed to bring the dough together.
- Divide the dough in half and roll each into a 6.5-inch round circle.
- Carefully dump filling onto the top of one of the circles, leaving a 1/2 border around the edges.
- Combine the remaining 1 tablespoon of heavy cream and egg to make an egg wash. Brush on the edges of scone and top with second disk of dough. Press edges gently to seal.
- Place on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper and freeze for 30 minutes.
- Meanwhile, preheat oven to 400°F.
- Remove scones from freezer and use a knife to cut into 6 wedges. Space evenly on the prepared sheet pan.
- Combine the remaining granulated sugar and ground cinnamon. Brush the tops of scones with more egg wash and sprinkle with the cinnamon-sugar.
- Bake until the bottoms of the scones are browned, 20-25 minutes. Let cool.
Make the drizzle:
- Whisk the powdered sugar, heavy cream, and vanilla together to make a thick drizzle.
- Drizzle over cooled scones and let set for a few minutes before serving.
- Scones are best served the day they are baked.
What were your changes to the original recipe?
The original recipe is labeled as vanilla cinnamon scones with vanilla extract in the scones, vanilla sugar sprinkled on top, and vanilla bean in the glaze. I just put vanilla extract in the glaze and used cinnamon sugar on top of the scones.
This looks so delicious. I will try to make this at home.
Thanks for the recipe.
I made them today…I put buttermilk in them instead of heavy cream….they are amazing!
I was very disappointed. I baked them for only 20 min. N they were slightly burned. I haven’t tasted them yet. I should have known that was too long to bake on 400. Hopefully nobody else makes this mistake. ?
Hi Corrine! So sorry this recipe didn’t work out for you. I bake all my scones and biscuits at 400 degrees F for about 20 minutes, depending on size. And I believe most recipes you can find elsewhere will have similar instructions. Still, I know every oven is different and I always keep a close eye on things in the oven the first time I make them just in case they cook faster than the recipe suggests.
I made these today. They were wonderful! Light and just the right texture. Perfect taste. Husband and two sons (in their 20’s) all loved them! My son came in afterwards to make sure I knew where the recipe was so that I could make it again in the future! 🙂 Delicious and light, not heavy at all. (cooked them 20 min)
I have a question, can you use half and half instead of heavy cream?
That probably will work, haven’t tested it though!
I’ve made this today but the dough turned out super wet n sticky, is it supposed to be like that?
There really is no egg in the dough? Just the egg wash?
Yep!
These scones were so delicious! The only thing was that some of them fell in the oven, but besides that these have got to be the best scones I have ever baked.
These are delicious and easy to make.
First time making these, everyone loves them, making more for the holidays!!
I really, really enjoyed these! The first scones I’ve ever made. I baked them at 20 and while delicious I probably could have pulled them out at 18-19 min – my oven probably got just a little too hot! Subbed with light cream because my whole grocery store was missing heavy cream! Came out just fine.
Can these be frozen before baking?
Absolutely! Store in the freezer for a month or more, and bake directly from frozen, adding a few minutes to baking time.
The taste is amazing, BUT about 1/3 burned. I checked on them at 18 minutes and had to immediately remove them. I would recommend either checking them at 14 minutes or turning the temp down to 375 or 350. Otherwise, everything is perfect.
OMG these are so great—I did not have time to freeze them for 30 minutes though-I cut them into 8–seemed like enough to eat—
Always get compliments when I make these. Thank you so much for sharing this recipe!
I have been making this recipes for years, it’s so good and easy. The base of the recipe is super easy to update with different fillings too.
But I am wondering, do you have a savory version of this recipe? I’ve got some leftover bacon, chives and cheese and they’d make the perfect savory scone.
Oh I love the idea of turning these into savory scones!
So i managed to bake the scones using your recipe. The scones taste wonderful. However the filling disappeared. Hehe. Am i the only one who has this problem?. Since i still have some frozen dough, i will try to compact the filling instead of it being powdery and see how it goes. But so far, five stars
Taste amazing but all my tops slid off and baked into its neighbor. Solution?
Shoot! You don’t want that. Two things come to mind: 1) Did you use the egg wash to seal the edges of the top and bottom together? and 2) I’m wondering if the scone dough wasn’t cold enough. Don’t forget to chill it in the freezer as written in the recipe. You can even chill it for longer if you’d like! I hope these suggestions help.