These banana nut scones are deliciously moist, flaky, and crumbly. Combining the flavor of banana bread and the texture of scones, this banana scone recipe is everything you crave for breakfast. Don’t skip the maple icing because it’s one of the best parts!
These banana scones were a complete spur-of-the-moment recipe. When I have a bounty of extra ripe bananas, I usually bake a couple loaves of banana bread or my favorite banana muffins. My mom was visiting, so I decided to try something new and special. We both love scones and banana bread, so I decided to combine the two.
We ended up LOVING them, especially the walnuts in each bite. I tweaked the recipe a few times after that and I’m confident these are the best banana scones. They’re crumbly and flaky on the outside, but have that deliciously soft banana bread texture inside. We topped them with crunchy coarse sugar and a generous drizzle of maple icing.
These banana nut scones turned out 19385x better than I dreamed and instantly climbed to the top of my favorite scone list. Admittedly, I have about over a dozen favorite scone recipes!
Banana Bread & Banana Muffins Vs. Banana Scones
What banana scones have that banana bread and banana muffins do not:
- Crackly crunchy top
- Irresistible crispy crumbles
- Nooks & crannies for delicious icing absorption
- Flaky center
Banana bread and banana muffins will never be banana scones!!!
Banana Scone Ingredients
You need a handful of basic ingredients for banana scones including flour, brown sugar, bananas, egg, butter, and a few others. The best performance award goes to the following 4 power ingredients: mashed bananas, yogurt, frozen butter, and brown sugar.
- Bananas: You need about 3 medium or 2 large ripe bananas. Make sure they are spotty brown. When mashed, they should yield 1 cup (230g). The most efficient way to mash bananas is to use your handheld or stand mixer. Try to rid all those banana lumps!
- Greek Yogurt: The first time I made these banana scones, I used heavy cream. Heavy cream is my favorite standard scone ingredient. The scones were good, but they spread all over baking sheet even though I increased the flour. Rather than add even more flavorless flour, I swapped the cream for yogurt. The yogurt helps keep the scones moist, a far cry from the cardboard scones we’ve all tasted before.
- Grated Frozen Butter: Not just cold butter—frozen butter. Why? It’s important to use cold butter in scone baking. When the little bits and pieces of butter melt as the scones bake, they release steam and create little pockets of air. As a result, the scones are a little airy on the inside while remaining crisp on the outside. You want the butter to melt in the oven, not before the scones even hit the oven. Frozen butter is easy to grate and grated butter is easy to cut into the dry ingredients. You’ll use frozen butter in these ham & cheese scones, too.
- Brown Sugar: Why use flavorless white sugar when you can use deliciously moist and rich-tasting brown sugar? I have the same mindset when making banana bread!
I call these power ingredients because they make a POWERFUL difference in how the scones taste. For mega banana scone success, I recommend you follow this recipe closely.
How to Make Banana Scones
- Mix the wet ingredients. This includes the mashed bananas.
- Mix the dry ingredients.
- Cut in the butter. You can use a pastry cutter, two forks, or your hands.
- Mix the wet & dry ingredients together.
- Spoon dough onto baking sheets. Use a 1/4 cup measuring cup.
- Brush with milk and sprinkle with coarse sugar.
- Bake. Then drizzle with icing!
This banana scone recipe yields about 12 palm-sized scones. Expect a sticky and craggily dough. Like biscuits, avoid overworking the dough. You’ll notice that I brush the scones with milk before baking. This is an essential step! This layer of liquid “sets” on top and drizzles down the sides as the scones bake, creating an even crispier exterior.
Can I Use Frozen Bananas?
Yes and I do this often. Thaw the frozen bananas at room temperature. Drain off any excess liquid, mash, then use as instructed in the recipe below. See How to Freeze & Thaw Bananas for Baking.
My #1 Scone Trick
My #1 tip when making any scones is to keep the scone dough as cold as possible. If the scones are room temperature or warm going into the oven, they will overspread and the texture will be ruined. Don’t be afraid to refrigerate your wet ingredients as you’re working on the dry ingredients. And you can refrigerate the scone dough prior to baking too.
The Best Finishing Touch: Maple Icing
These banana scones have all the flavor from banana bread including cinnamon spice, brown sugar, and banana. Maple icing is the BEST finishing touch… because everything is better blanketed with maple!! Simply melt butter and maple syrup together, then whisk in sifted confectioners’ sugar. The icing seeps into all the cracks and crevices. That top maple-soaked surface is the best part!
This banana scone recipe yields such a unique texture—an incredible mash up of banana bread and scones. Get those bananas browning and start pre-heating your oven!
More Favorite Banana Recipes
- Banana Cake & Banana Cream Pie
- Banana Bread & Banana Muffins
- Banoffee Pie
- Chocolate Banana Muffins & Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins
Banana Nut Scones with Maple Glaze
- Prep Time: 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 25 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour
- Yield: 12 scones
- Category: Breakfast
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: English
Description
Deliciously moist, flaky, and crumbly banana nut scones with maple glaze. Not quite banana bread or banana muffins, but everything you crave for breakfast!
Ingredients
- 1 cup (230g) mashed bananas (about 3 medium or 2 large ripe bananas)
- 1/4 cup (60g) plain Greek yogurt (or any plain yogurt or sour cream)
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 2 and 1/2 cups (313g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 2 and 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 5 Tablespoons (70g) unsalted butter, frozen
- 1 cup (125g) chopped walnuts (optional)
- top before baking: 3 Tablespoons (45ml) milk and coarse sugar
Maple Glaze
- 2 Tablespoons (30g) unsalted butter
- 1/3 cup (80ml) pure maple syrup
- 1 cup (112g) sifted confectioners’ sugar
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400°F (204°C). Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. Set aside.
- In a stand mixer or medium bowl with a handheld mixer, beat the mashed bananas, yogurt, brown sugar, egg, and vanilla extract together. Set aside.
- In a large bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt together. Grate the frozen butter (I use a box grater to grate it; a food processor also works for grating). Toss the grated butter into the flour mixture and combine it with a pastry cutter, two forks, a food processor, or your fingers until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Set aside.
- Drizzle wet ingredients over flour mixture, add the walnuts, and then toss the mixture together with a rubber spatula until everything appears moistened. Try your best to not overwork the dough at any point. Dough will be sticky and a little wet. Drop scones, 1/4 cup of dough each, at least 3 inches apart on the prepared baking sheet. Brush scones with milk, then top with a little coarse sugar if desired for extra crunch. Tastes great!
- Bake for 20-25 minutes or until lightly golden and cooked through. Remove from the oven and cool as you make the icing. The scones taste even better after they cool down!
- Make the icing: In a small saucepan over low heat, melt the butter and maple syrup together, whisking occasionally. Once the butter has melted, remove from heat and whisk in the sifted confectioners’ sugar. Drizzle over scones.
- Scones are best enjoyed right away, though leftover scones keep well at room temperature or in the refrigerator for about 3-5 days.
Notes
- Make Ahead & Freezing Instructions: Some options here. The baking powder is initially activated once wet and if you hold off on baking, the scones won’t rise as much in the oven. However, the decrease in rise is so slight that it doesn’t make a noticeable difference. That being said, you can shape this scone dough into wedges and refrigerate overnight before baking. You can also freeze before baking. Freeze scone dough wedges on a plate or baking sheet for 1 hour. Once relatively frozen, you can layer them in a freezer-friendly bag or container. Bake from frozen, adding a few minutes to the bake time in the recipe below. Or thaw overnight, then bake as directed. You can also freeze the baked and cooled scones before topping with icing. To thaw, leave out on the counter for a few hours or overnight in the refrigerator. Warm in the microwave for 30 seconds or on a baking sheet in a 300°F (149°C) oven for 10 minutes.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Mixer (Handheld or Stand) | Glass Mixing Bowls | Box Grater | Pastry Cutter | Baking Sheet | Silicone Baking Mat or Parchment Paper | Pastry Brush | Coarse Sugar (optional)
- Frozen Bananas: You can use frozen bananas here. Thaw the frozen bananas. Drain off any excess liquid, mash, then use as instructed in the recipe. See How to Freeze & Thaw Bananas for Baking.
Keywords: scones
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Turned out good! I didn’t add nuts or syrup, but I added in some ripe peaches that I needed to use and it all worked. The bottoms were a bit dark so temperature needs to come down a bit. Thanks!
★★★
These scones are ok, not great. I will try another recipe next time.
★★★
I have been a baker for years and wish I’d found your recipe earlier. These are the best scones I’ve ever made. Love the combination of spices with the banana – must top with maple icing as this finishes them off – superb! Will be a family fav now – thank you.
★★★★★
Wow! so so delicious… I used pecan nuts and the nuts along with the banana and the maple icing was so tasty, hubby was so impressed. Will make these again and again, thank you.
★★★★★
How many calories?
What is the nutritional information?
Hi Ro! We don’t usually include nutrition information as it can vary between different brands of the same ingredients. Plus, many recipes have ingredient substitutions or optional ingredients listed. However, there are many handy online calculators where you can plug in and customize your exact ingredients/brands. Readers have found this one especially helpful: https://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-calculator.asp
Would it work to sub out the yogurt for buttermilk?
Hi Michelle! Yogurt or sour cream is best for these scones, buttermilk will be too thin.
Scones came out perfect other than one major issue… my parchment paper burnt and so did the bottom of the scones… they are edible I just have to cut off the bottoms. Why did this happen? Any ideas?
★★★★★
Hi Heather! Try moving the rack you’re baking the scones in away from the heat source in your oven (move it up if the heat source is on the bottom). You can also try turning your oven down a bit next time – it may run a bit hot. So glad you enjoyed them!
can sour cream be subbed for the yogurt?
Hi Lee, absolutely — same amount.
I haven’t made this flavor of scones yet but I did make my 1st scones ever yesterday starting with your strawberry scones. Right now I have your blueberry scone dough chilling in the fridge. Would have left a comment on both of those recipes but it’s locked. Gotta admit. I had trouble with the strawberry dough even though my strawberries were dried out as much as I could get them. I got so nervous because I felt like I had overworked the dough but… they came out beautifully!! Today’s dough was so much easier to do (I wasn’t as nervous as I was yesterday, lol). I can’t wait until I can baked them up. My blueberries are FULL of flavor. Instead of adding cinnamon I added some lemon juice and zest. I made sure to keep EVERYTHING cold, even the cream. After measuring I put it into the freezer. My next flavor is going to be cinnamon. I found those cinnamon chips at my local Walmart 2 weeks ago. Even though I had no idea what I was going to make with them I grabbed a bag because I didn’t know they existed, lol. Can’t wait to make this flavor as well as an orange flavored scone. Thanks for yet another great recipe Sally…
★★★★★
These banana scones were perfect! I made them without nuts but they were still fantastic.
★★★★★
This was my first attempt at scones and these are delicious and easy; the banana flavor really shines (tasted before glazing!). My husband who typically doesn’t like scones loved them. Thank you!
★★★★★
Excellent, I will certainly make these again. They came out perfect.
★★★★★
I just made these. OH MY! Delicious. Definitely will be making these again. Such a nice change from the usual muffins and banana bread.
★★★★★
The glaze alone makes this worth it! Definitely didn’t turn out like a scone as far as textures is concerned and a little bit different than a muffin but equally delicious! Would definitely recommend This recipe. I baked for 20 min at 400° And put a pan on the bottom rack like others suggested and the bottoms didn’t burn.
★★★★★
one more question. Does sour cream work instead of yogurt? Or a mix of sour cream and buttermilk?
Hi Lee, sour cream will work.
Do you have an opinion on the relative merits of a wedge shaped 8 portion scone pan as opposed to scones cut with a bench knife? both frozen briefly before baking.
Hi Lee, we’ve never tried scones in a speciality scone pan, so we can’t say for sure. If you try both versions and have any feedback, we’d certainly be interested!
We always put our bananas that have turned brown/black in the freezer and then typically use them for banana bread/muffins, but I was looking for something else to make with them. Will this recipe work with frozen bananas (after letting them sit out to thaw for a bit)?
Thank you for all your amazing recipes, tips and for being a baking guardian angel! 😉
Definitely! Bananas that have been frozen and thawed can sometimes be too wet – give them a quick dab with a paper towel to soak up any excess moisture before beginning.
What if you already mashed the bananas before freezing? I’ve had 2 zip lock bags totally a cup in each bag in the freezer just waiting to be used. I’ve been making scones almost every day since I found that Sally had scone recipes, lol. Would love to add some chopped baking chocolate to these. Since I don’t have yogurt I read that it was okay to use coconut milk? Sure hope so . Please get back to me as soon as you can. Thanks as always Sally…
Hi Tammie! Same principle applies to your mashed bananas – make sure to thaw and dab extra moisture away before using. You can use full fat coconut milk in place of the yogurt/sour cream. Hope you love these!
Thanks for the reply Trina. I tried to dab my mashed bananas but that was like dabbing water, lol. Instead of using coconut milk I used sour cream. I put 4 oz of roughly chopped baking chocolate in the batter. I used 2oz of semisweet and 2oz of German’s sweet chocolate. These came out good. Not great but good. They have the texture of a muffin rather than a scone but you know I’m still gonna devour these, lol. Instead of brushing the tops with milk, didn’t have any, I brushed them with heavy cream. That worked great to give them that crunchy top. That and the raw sugar I’ve been using on every scone recipe I’ve made. After reading the comments I decided to lower my temp down to 375°. They baked up in 23 mins without any burning on the bottoms. There’s 2 more variations I want to make. Just a plain orange scone and a pineapple/coconut scone. If anyone’s made the orange scone recipe without the cranberries can you please let me know how you achieved it? I really want the orange flavor to be as prominent as possible. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again for the reply Trina…
★★★★★
Oh boy, 20 minutes is an awfully long time for these! Mine were quite crispy after 16-17 minutes. Otherwise, another great recipe from Sally!
★★★★
These scones are amazing! I replaced the nuts with mini chocolate chips and my whole family loved them. crunchy on the outside, soft and flaky on the inside, yum. The maple icing is amazing on top but WARNING, it makes way too much! I halved it (5 1/2 tbsp maple syrup, 1 tbsp butter, and half a cup of icing sugar) and I still had plenty to drizzle on each scone, and even had a little bit left over. So yeah, please half the icing recipe, you won’t regret it!
★★★★★
These turned out more cake or bread like what did I do wrong? I used real maple butter which makes everything heavenly and these were awesome too I’m just not sure they taste like scones but I’m not really sure…thanks for a reason to use my maple butter
★★★★★
Hi Sally – I made your cranberry scones with full fat coconut milk and they were the best scones I have ever made! Could I use full fat coconut milk in this recipe too instead of yogurt?
Hi Lisa, absolutely!
Excellent! Will not disappoint. Follow the recipe exactly as it says. Only thing is that I didn’t need that much glaze.
★★★★★
Can I use heavy cream instead but in less amount? I don’t have either yogurt or sour cream so I wanted to use my heavy cream. Thanks.
Hi Veronica, I don’t recommend it. Heavy cream is too thin for these scones.
I made these today, exactly as instructed, and they turned out great! Raves from 4 neighbors and the two of us. I did think the quantity of glaze was a little too much for our taste, but discovered it is also great with a little extra on each bite!
★★★★★
These banana scones turned out more like muffin tops. Flavor is good, but I wanted the crispy top and flaky layers of a traditional scone.
★★★
These scones turned out amazing! I used
gluten free bobs red mill flour and froze the scones before I baked them and they are amazing! First time making scones and these were super simple and quick!
★★★★★
Made these this morning. Sorry to say, not as good as either a good scone or a good banana walnut muffin. A hybrid that does not improve on either age-old concept.
★★
Mine burnt on the bottom too.
These scones turned out great!! I replaced half the flour with whole wheat flour and reduced the sugar by a bit. We threw in blueberries and pecans. Mine had burnt bottoms too, so will reduce the temp next time. Thank you!!
Hands down best scones recipe. I am hooked on these in all the flavors and combinations. My family love them too. Thank you!
Just made these. I’m on a big scone binge lately. They did NOT disappoint. And that GLAZE. MY GOD. A+++
★★★★★