Either the night before or a few hours before you want to make the scones take your softened butter and mix the cinnamon with it until well combined.

Take the butter mixture and place the butter in the center of a piece of parchment paper and tightly roll it. Freeze this until completely frozen- overnight or 4-5 hours.

First, with a small cutting board and chef’s knife take and chop the frozen butter into small pieces. Then take and place back in the freezer while you prep the other ingredients. You want cold butter!

NOTE: You can also grate the frozen butter if you prefer but if you are like me that sounds like no fun! I think chopping the butter is an easier process.

Next, in a large bowl combine the flour, brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Mix well and then set flour mixture aside.

In a medium bowl whisk together the sourdough discard, egg, vanilla extract, cream, buttermilk, and pumpkin until they are well combined.

Next you can take the chopped cinnamon butter from the freezer and toss it in the dry ingredients. You will want to work quickly at this point as you don’t want your ingredients to get too warm as you are mixing them up.

Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix with a fork a few times before transferring to a clean work surface. Knead the dough a couple of times- you want it to be just coming together. You don’t want to overwork the dough!

Next shape the scone dough into either 1 8-inch disc or 2 smaller ones depending on the size of scones you prefer.

Take a bench scraper or sharp knife and cut the disc(s) into 8(16) equal pieces. Transfer to a parchment lined baking sheet and place in the freezer for 30 minutes. In the meantime, preheat the oven on the convection setting, if you have it, to 400 degrees.

After the 30 minutes, remove the unbaked scones from the freezer and sprinkle the top of the scones with some granulated sugar.

Place the scones into the preheated oven and bake for 18-22 minutes until the scones have nice golden-brown spots. Leave the scones in for a couple of extra minutes if they still are not golden brown. You want them to have some golden spots because this is where that beautiful crunch comes from. Once they are finished baking, remove them promptly from the pan to a wire rack to cool.

Using a whisk; in a small bowl combine the powdered sugar, maple syrup and cream. Add the cream one tablespoon at a time until you reach a good drizzling consistency.

Once the delicious scones are mostly cooled, drizzle the icing over the scones. The icing can be optional, but I enjoy the little bit of sweetness and cream it adds to these pumpkin scones!

Enjoy these scones with a cup of coffee or tea!