Truthfully, I never really made scones before. I have made biscuits, and my god, I love me a flaky biscuit, but with scones, they just felt too much like a biscuit that was trying to be a cookie(I know that if you’re British or Australian, reading that sentence would make no sense, but bear with me, I’m American and biscuits and cookies are classified as different things over on this side of the world). Scones are sweeter than a biscuit, and more cake-like too. I have been meaning to make some scones, but with a lot of the simpler things I have been posting, such as cupcakes and cookies, and egg tarts, I wanted to do something a lot less everyday, and a lot more special. So I opted to make a plated scone dessert. Because in my eyes, and probably the eyes of many others, scones are more like a breakfast item. Or an afternoon tea thing. I want to make a place for them in desserts as well, because screw it, if a sweetened biscuit with cream and berries counts as a dessert(and a delicious one at that, I’m not trying to hate on American strawberry shortcake), then so can a scone with a bunch of dessert elements.

For my dessert, I had already prepared some homemade dulce de leche, so I thought about using that to immediately give the scones the sugar kick they’ll need to be not-breakfast. With the flaky, biscuit-like texture of a scone, I knew that a shortcake meets pie route would be the smartest thing to do with them. So I thought about one of my absolute favorites, banoffee pie. This would actually be my fourth dessert post that was inspired by that, but I can’t help it. The combination of dulce de leche, bananas, and chocolate is really hard to beat, and it provides a lot of things you can work into a dessert. I had frozen bananas in my fridge for a while, so I knew I needed to get rid of those somehow as well. So I opted for a frozen banana parfait with a banana milk-chocolate chip scone, dulce de leche as my sauce, but also in a dark chocolate ganache, tempered dark chocolate shards, and nasturtium leaves(because I have them in my backyard and they grow in boatloads, but also that pepperiness helps cut back on cloying sweetness to leave the dessert more balanced). I named the dessert “Future Nostalgia” after the Dua Lipa song, but also because it takes childhood memories of shortcake and adulthood memories of banoffee pie and springboards them forward with new memories of making scones and dulce de leche from scratch.

For the dulce de leche:
14 oz sweetened condensed milk
a pinch of salt

Simmer the condensed milk, in the can, in a covered pot of water for 8 hours. Cool down at room temperature for an hour before chilling overnight. Remove from can and mix in salt to finish.

For the frozen banana parfait:
1 banana
1/4 cup banana milk
2 teaspoons gelatin powder + 1 tablespoon water
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 egg yolks
a pinch of salt
1/4 cup granulated sugar

Freeze the banana overnight. In a pot, temper the banana milk with egg yolks, salt, sugar, and the gelatin powder, whisking until all of the ingredients have dissolved into the liquid. Strain and allow to cool down to room temperature. Peel and puree the frozen banana into the banana milk liquid. Whip heavy cream to stiff peaks and fold through. Pipe into 1 inch silicone half dome molds, smoothing out the surface with an offset spatula, and freeze until solid, about 1-2 hours.

For the banana milk-chocolate chip scones:
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour + more for rolling
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 stick unsalted butter, cold and cubed
a pinch of salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup banana milk
1/3 cup dark chocolate chips, roughly chopped

In a bowl, combine your sugar, flour, butter, baking powder, soda, and salt, mixing together to form a crumbly texture. Create a well in the middle. Add in your vanilla and banana milk and mix together to form a dough. Roll out onto a floured surface, to about 1/4 inch thickness. Press in chocolate chips. Fold the dough into thirds, brochure style, by bringing the sides into the center. Roll out again to 1/4 inch thickness and cut out 1/4 inch by 1/4 inch cubes. Transfer the cubes to a lined sheet pan. Brush the tops of these scones with your egg wash and sprinkle on sugar. Bake at 400 degrees F for 10 minutes. Cool down completely before removing from the sheet pan.

For the egg wash:
1 egg yolk
3 tablespoons banana milk
a pinch of salt
granulated sugar

Beat together everything but the sugar.

For the dulce de leche ganache:
1/4 cup dark chocolate
2 tablespoons dulce de leche
a pinch of salt

Combine together over a double boiler, mixing with a rubber spatula until everything is melted together and combined. Chill down for about 20 minutes before whipping to lighten. Transfer to a piping bag and use immediately.

For the tempered chocolate shards:
1/4 cup dark chocolate
a pinch of salt

Over a double boiler, melt down 3 tablespoons of your dark chocolate. Mix, off heat, for 2-3 minutes, until the temperature of the chocolate has come down to about 85 degrees before mixing in the rest of your chocolate and salt. Pour over acetate or parchment and spread as thinly as possible. Refrigerate for 10 minutes and then break into smaller pieces to use for garnish.

For garnish:
Fresh nasturtium leaves

To garnish, start with your dulce de leche on the bottom. Place three scones along the plate with three domes of the parfait. Pipe on the ganache, and garnish with your chocolate shards and nasturtium leaves to finish.