It took us awhile to get here, but we finally made it. The moving boxes are completely unpacked and everything is in its place, mise en place, ready for creating. The energy is heavy with it, with the readiness. Projects are stirring, travels are calling, and hands are aching with the eagerness to be gripping, kneading, pulling, sculpting. Spring.
But there is so much to do and never enough time for the doing. Leading, inevitably, to impatience, stress, meltdowns. O tells me that everything doesn’t need to be done now (correct) and that maybe I should go for a walk outside (good idea). So I take a walk. Did you know that vitamin D actually can’t travel through windows? You have to go outside to soak in this essential nutrition from the sun. So I walk, or run, through the city, get a good cup of coffee or a sandwich, and I always, always feel better.
With the new job and new commute from Baltimore to DC every day, there is never enough time to cook and bake as often as I’d like. But I am developing my tricks to get me through the week – freezer meals, family-style casseroles that with lunch leftovers baked in, and staples that can be combined into a quick dinner on a weeknight. And one of my new go-to’s is baking up a batch of muffins, scones, or biscuits on Sunday evening for breakfasts on the train during the week.
Enter the jammer – a flaky scone filled with a dollop of jam. It’s the commuter’s dream breakfast, with the all-so-necessary smidgen of jam tucked neatly inside the biscuit without worry for drips or a mess. And it’s substantial. By the time mid-morning rolls around and lunchtime is still two hours away, I reach for a jammer with the morning’s second cup of coffee, and it fills me up until my next meal.
The recipe is adapted from Grand Central Bakery’s infamous jammers in Seattle. I’ve subbed half of the white flour for buckwheat, which lends a nutty and buttery flavor and texture to the jammers. Definitely search for buckwheat flour if you can, and if all else fails, give whole wheat flour a go. Use whatever jam you have on hand – my favorites are dark berry jams, like blackberry, blueberry, and raspberry jams, that I put up last summer after our weekend berry-picking excursions. O’s favorite is strawberry.
buckwheat jammers
adapted from Grand Central Bakery
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups buckwheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (2 sticks) cold, unsalted butter, cut into 1/2″ cubes
1 1/4 – 1 1/2 cold buttermilk (or whole milk with 1 tablespoon freshly-squeezed lemon juice mixed in)
about 1 cup of your favorite jam
Mix the flours, baking powder, salt, and baking soda together with a whisk in a large bowl. Cut in the butter with a pastry knife or your fingertips, like you would if you were making pie pastry. (See my recipe for pie pastry here for more detailed instructions.) The goal is to keep the butter as cold as possible, with visible flakes of butter (about the size of peas) distributed throughout the flour. If you’re prepping the pastry the night before and intend to bake in the morning, stop here – cover the dough with plastic wrap and store in the refrigerator overnight. If you’re baking the jammers now, proceed with the recipe.
Slowly pour the buttermilk into the flour mixture and stir it in with a wooden spoon. Keep adding buttermilk, a little at a time, until the dough *just* comes together. You want it to be a little shaggy and dry in spots. If your pastry gets too wet, add in more flour.
Now, quickly knead the dough together on a lightly floured counter until it comes together. There might be some floury scraps – that’s okay. Just press them into the big mass of dough the best you can. Press your dough into a circle about 1 1/2 – 2 inches high. Using a biscuit cutter or the rim of a drinking glass, cut your jammers out of the dough and set aside. When you can’t cut any more jammers, smoosh together your leftover dough and cut it with your biscuit cutter again until you’ve used up all of your dough. You should have about 12 jammers.
Preheat the oven to 350 and line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Place your jammers on the baking sheet, leaving about 2 inches between each one.
Using your thumb, gently press into the center of each jammer, making a quarter-sized hole in the middle. You don’t want to press through the bottom of the jammer, and you don’t want to push too forcefully and crush the delicate, flaky layers of the jammer. If you ever made pinch pots in elementary school, put this technique to good use here! Fill each hole with a tablespoon of jam.
Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, rotating the baking sheets halfway through the baking time. The finished jammers should be a deep golden brown.
This looks like a fabulous way to use up the last little bit of persimmon jam in my fridge!
Beautiful Job, Little One! I love the pic of the computer next to all the baking ingredients. Grandma’s baking meets Grand-daughter’s kitchen. You are amazing! Love, AK p.s. John has also figured out that the best remedy for almost anything is to send me outside for a walk. It must be in our genes that we don’t function correctly without outdoor time.
xo
Great blog!
Could you write approximately how much butter and milk you use, in kilo or oz? I’m from Scandinavia and don’t know how much butter two sticks contain or how much a buttermilk carton is
Not sure – you can do a quick Google search though for measurements. Good luck!
Those look so lovely!
I learn new things everyday…and today I’ve learnt about the jammer. So far my scones have always been store-bought (yes, go ahead, gasp if you want to), topped with sliced strawberries and whipped cream swirls straight out of a can. Although, my grandmother feeds me ginger scones with ginger jams and Devonshire clotted cream every time I visit her. But I digress.
Jammers. I think these are going on my to-try list.
Gorgeous photography.
Thank you for this recipe! It caught my eye when you posted about it and has now become the official breakfast baked good of this summer at our house. I love the fact that it’s not too sweet — I actually have a sweet tooth, but the dollop of jam is enough to satisfy it, and there’s no sugar in the dough itself.
Awww LOVE IT. Enjoy!