First day of spring - HA!

It's snowing.  And it's the first day of spring.  Mother Nature does like her little jokes, I suppose.

I have wonderful memories of baking with my mom on days such as this.   Warm baking smells are so comforting when the weather stinks.  So there was nothing for it but to bake.  I let the piles of laundry wait until later in the afternoon and got out the flour and sugar, etc.  Unfortunately my mom was at work so I couldn't have her join me today. 

A little over a week ago I persuaded the girls to forego Nick and Disney Channel in favor of the Food Network.  Nigella Lawson was on making scones.  The girls thought they looked delicious and I love them so I figured I'd give it a shot.  I searched Nigella's website and found about 40 scone recipes.  I took a little from this one and a little from that one and made some with chocolate chips and some with cranberries.  They came out great.

Abby liked the chocolate chip ones.  Rachel wasn't a fan at all.  I loved them both but preferred the cranberry - which is strange for me.  I'm usually all about the chocolate.

Today I decided to do something different.  My friend T. and I try to meet for coffee every weekend at Starbucks.  We sometimes treat ourselves and split a scone - but not as much now that they no longer carry the Maple Oat ones.  Not sure why they stopped making them but it is really a shame - they were delicious.  I googled and found a recipe at food.com.  My only problem was that it called for maple extract and I didn't have any.  I stopped at ShopRite after dropping my daughter off at school and they didn't have it either.  With the weather so lousy I decided to wing it rather than do any more shopping around.  I added more maple syrup than was called for and used a little vanilla extract.  The result was decidedly not very "mapley" - but delicious just the same.

I think I'll keep these babies all to myself.  I doubt the kids would like them anyway, right?  And my husband's not a scone person so he won't mind.  I will bring a few to coffee with T. next time we meet, though.

I'd better freeze them though or they won't last the day.  One of the hazards of being home.

It would be good to make something especially for my husband next time, don't you think?  Maybe chocolate mousse cake? Anyone have any good recipes?  Feel free to post in the comments.

Of course that's a project for another day.

(P.S. I did let Abby try one when she got home from school.  She liked it, darn it.)