These high altitude chocolate scones are soft and fudgy, loaded with chocolate chips and crunchy walnuts, and drizzled with sweet vanilla icing.
You might also love these high altitude recipes for almond cream cheese scones, cinnamon apple pecan scones, and maple pumpkin cinnamon scones.
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Why You’ll Love This Recipe
Soft and Tender. Scones can have a reputation for being dry, crumbly and tasteless, but these have a rich chocolatey flavor from the cocoa powder and chocolate chips. And they are perfectly tender with plenty of butter and milk to keep them moist.
Easy to Make. The scone dough comes together quickly and easily, and then you simply need to pat it out onto a baking sheet to bake. If you have a scone pan, you can use that with this recipe, too.
High Altitude Tested. I develop all the recipes on my site for Denver’s altitude of 5,280 feet. If you’re at a lower or higher elevation, please see my FAQs for guidance on adjusting recipes for your altitude.
See the recipe card at the end of the post for the full ingredients list and instructions.
Ingredients
- Cocoa Powder. I only use Dutch processed cocoa powder for my baking, which has a much richer flavor and deeper color than natural cocoa powder. For today’s recipe, I used Cacao Barry Extra Brute cocoa powder.
- Butter. Be sure your butter (as well as your milk) is very cold, which will create flaky, tender layers in the scones.
- Add-Ins. I added both semi-sweet chocolate chips as well as walnuts to my scones for more flavor and crunch. You can use milk chocolate chips for more sweetness, and the walnuts are optional. Dried sweetened cranberries or cherries would also be good with the chocolate.
Instructions
- In a bowl, combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, salt and brown sugar.
- Add the butter, and use a pastry cutter to cut the butter in until crumbly, and the pieces of butter are no bigger than peas.
- Stir in the chocolate chips and chopped walnuts.
- Add the vanilla and milk, and stir together into a shaggy dough.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper, and scrape the dough onto the paper. If the dough is sticky, dust it lightly with a little more flour, and use your hands to shape it into a thick disk, about 7-8 inches in diameter. Set the pan in the freezer to chill for 10 minutes while you preheat the oven.
- Position a rack in the center of the oven, and preheat the oven to 375 F.
- Use a floured bench scraper or a sharp knife to cut the dough into 8 wedges, but do not separate the wedges.
- Bake the scones for 30 minutes.Baker’s Note: After about 20 minutes, I take the pan out of the oven, and if the scones are spreading a little too much, I push them back together to help keep their shape. Return the pan to the oven to finish baking the full 30 minutes.
- After 30 minutes, cut the scones again and separate the wedges. They should be baked through, but if they still seem a little doughy in the center, you can bake them for an additional 2-5 minutes. Be careful not to over-bake them, though, which will dry them out.
- To make the icing, whisk together all of the icing ingredients until smooth. Drizzle the icing over the warm scones. Before the icing sets, decorate the top of the scones with a few more chocolate chips and walnuts.
- Enjoy warm or at room temperature.
Be sure to read all of my BAKING FAQs where I discuss ingredients, substitutions and common baking questions, so that you can be successful in your own baking!
Frequently Asked Questions
Store leftover scones in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
These scones are not overly sweet on their own, which is why I don’t recommend serving them without the icing. The sweet powdered sugar icing perfectly balances the bitter flavor of the cocoa powder. Adding too much additional sugar to the scone dough can cause them to spread too much as they bake.
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High Altitude Chocolate Walnut Scones
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- Pastry Cutter
- Baking Sheet + Parchment Paper
Ingredients
Scones
- 1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- ¼ cup unsweetened Dutch processed cocoa powder
- 4 tsp baking powder
- ¼ tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- ⅔ cup light brown sugar, lightly packed
- 10 tbsp cold unsalted butter, cut into chunks or thin slices
- ¾ cup cold whole milk
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- ½ cup semi sweet chocolate chips
- ½ cup chopped walnuts, optional
Icing
- ¾ cup powdered sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 ½ – 2 tbsp milk or cream
Instructions
- In a bowl, combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, salt and brown sugar.
- Add the butter, and use a pastry cutter to cut the butter in until crumbly, and the pieces of butter are no bigger than peas.
- Stir in the chocolate chips and chopped walnuts.
- Add the vanilla and milk, and stir together into a shaggy dough.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper, and scrape the dough onto the paper. If the dough is sticky, dust it lightly with a little more flour, and use your hands to shape it into a thick disk, about 7-8 inches in diameter. Set the pan in the freezer to chill for 10 minutes while you preheat the oven.
- Position a rack in the center of the oven, and preheat the oven to 375 F.
- Use a floured bench scraper or a sharp knife to cut the dough into 8 wedges, but do not separate the wedges.
- Bake the scones for 30 minutes.Baker's Note: After about 20 minutes, I take the pan out of the oven, and if the scones are spreading a little too much, I push them back together to help keep their shape. Return the pan to the oven to finish baking the full 30 minutes.
- After 30 minutes, cut the scones again and separate the wedges. They should be baked through, but if they still seem a little doughy in the center, you can bake them for an additional 2-5 minutes. Be careful not to over-bake them, though, which will dry them out.
- To make the icing, whisk together all of the icing ingredients until smooth. Drizzle the icing over the warm scones. Before the icing sets, decorate the top of the scones with a few more chocolate chips and walnuts.
- Enjoy warm or at room temperature.
Notes
https://curlygirlkitchen.com/
Rich and easy to put together.
Dry fruits when combined with chocolate can do wonders. Thank you very much. The recipe above is great and helpful as well.