Remember my promise to post more regularly now that the roommate thing was over? Uh…oops. Just when you think your life is about to slow down, it speeds up even more. Murphy’s Law and all that, right? (Curse that darn Murphy! Who is Murphy anyway? If I give him scones will he cut me some slack?)

I definitely don’t want to bring acting up in this blog regularly, but I promise this isn’t really about acting. Acting just gave me the setting for The Great Mango Catastrophe of September 2014. The other weekend, I did this 5 manager showcase–short story even shorter you do a scene/monologue for 5 talent managers, they answer your questions, hopefully they like you and you like them, and we all celebrate with cake–after an audition in a completely different part of town. To kill the hours in between, I took a trip to Whole Foods for a little treat: MANGO.

In case you didn’t know, mango is my absolute favorite fruit, and when Whole Foods has good mango, they have good mango! I was sooooooo excited to eat it after my showcase. But while I was there, disaster struck! THE CONTAINER OPENED UP IN MY BAG AND ALL THE MANGO SPILLED INTO MY PURSE!!!!

I was literally sitting there in the Q&A area, super upset, looking ridiculous scooping mango out of the bottom of my bag. Some of the other actors started commenting on how sad it was that my purse was all wet and everything would be sticky and smell like fruit forever. I gave them a look of incredulity. My purse would be sticky? Who cares!?

NOW I WOULDN’T GET TO EAT MY MANGO!!!

So needless to say, everyone thought I was insane for caring more about the mango than my wallet and stuff, but did I mention it was perfect mango? It was tragic, like the worst tragedy to happen to me since the Baking Soda Fiasco. The only consolation was that I had some of these beauties hanging out in my freezer.

I’ve recently become hooked on macadamia nuts and coconut–separately–as you can all tell by the bags of both in my pantry and the dozen recipes using one of them. I even made white chocolate macadamia nut pancakes topped with coconut and oh my god can it be breakfast time now? So it was only fitting that I make a super tropical scone with all three of my latest obsessions!

And the flavors combined PERFECTLY into a delicious, sweet, buttery, tropical scone. The interesting twist is that I used brown sugar instead of white sugar. When I was developing this recipe, I noticed in my Flavor Bible book that individually all three mix-ins went well with brown sugar. Why not just swap out the sugars? Awesome idea because the slight molasses-y caramel-y notes in the brown sugar somehow tie the flavors of the mango, the coconut, and the macadamia nut all together. Keep the toppings simple by eating them plain or just clotted cream or whipped cream. These are perfect as is to soothe a broken mango heart.

mango coconut macadamia nut scones

ingredients

• 200 grams all-purpose flour (about 1½ cups + 2 tbsp)
• 2 tsp baking powder
• ¼ tsp salt
• 50 grams light brown sugar (about ¼ cup)
• 1/3 cup chopped ripe mango
• 1/3 cup chopped macadamia nuts
• 1/3 cup sweetened shredded coconut
• 150-225 mL heavy whipping cream

Preheat oven to 220°C (450°F). Place rack as high as possible in oven. Line a baking tray with parchment paper and set aside.

Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium sized mixing bowl. Add the sugar, mango, macadamia nuts, and coconut, mixing until well distributed.

Add 150 mL cream then work it in by hand by rubbing in the cream trying to incorporate as much air as possible until fully mixed. DO NOT OVERMIX. If the mix is too dry, now add the extra cream until the dough is wet enough to hold together.

Place dough on a heavily floured surface and knead a couple of times until relatively smooth. Pat down to desired height (we did about ½ inch). Cut out 5 cm circles with a crimped scone cutter and place on the baking tray. HINT: dip the cutter in flour before cutting out each scone. Knead the extras back together and repeat until most of the dough is used up.

Bake for 8-12 minutes (we did 10) until they have risen and are slightly browned around the edges and on top.