While visiting my grandparents in Arizona right before the holidays, I started feeling a slight tickle in my throat. I assumed it was a result of the arid desert climate (the extreme dryness even made my clothes and hair constantly full of static and cling to me at all times!), and I completely dismissed the feeling, concentrating on drinking extra water instead.
A few days later, I flew to Northern California to spend Christmas at my parents’ house, yet when I boarded the plane back to Southern California, I still noticed that tickle in my throat… And when I felt exhausted as I settled back into my seat just before takeoff, I realized I had actually caught a cold. Oops.
When I arrived back at my own house that night, I found a single dose of cold medicine in my bathroom cabinet, swallowed it, unpacked my suitcase, and crawled into bed. When I woke up over 10 hours later, I headed to the store for more medicine—and lots of Kleenex!
Before paying, I also grabbed some vitamin supplements. Although I take a multivitamin every day, I figured a little extra boost of vitamin C would be helpful!
As I dissolved the supplement in water back at my house and sipped that orange-flavored beverage, I realized how infrequently I bake with oranges. Sure, I always look forward to creating new cranberry orange flavored recipes during the fall, but I often forget about baking with them the rest of the year, even though I eat oranges year round!
So once I felt healthy again, I worked on perfecting this new Healthy Orange Poppy Seed Scones recipe to share with you! These scones are supremely moist on the inside with a slight hint of a crust on the outside, and they have plenty of bright sunshiny orange flavor. Such a fun twist on the classic lemon poppy seed pairing!
Even better? These healthy orange poppy seed scones contain no eggs, refined flour or sugar! Plus they require just one bowl and 30 minutes to make, and they’re just 139 calories!
So let’s go over how to make these healthy orange poppy seed scones!
You’ll start with… You guessed it… One bowl! And into that bowl, you’ll add white whole wheat flour, baking powder, salt, and poppy seeds. It’d be nearly impossible to make healthy orange poppy seed scones without the poppy seeds, right? I tend to add a tiny bit more than in most recipes to make sure there are lots of dark little specks in every bite!
Perhaps you’re tired of hearing me say this… Or perhaps you’re new around here and haven’t yet heard me repeat this like a broken record? Either way…
Yes, white whole wheat flour actually exists! It’s not a combination of white (aka all purpose) flour and regular whole wheat flour. Instead, white whole wheat flour is made by finely grinding a special type of soft white wheat (hence the name!), whereas regular whole wheat flour comes from a heartier variety of red wheat. They both have the same health benefits (like extra fiber!), but white whole wheat flour has a lighter taste and texture, which lets the moist texture and citrus flavor of your healthy orange poppy seed scones truly shine!
And speaking of fruit… It’s time to whisk in the first orange component: orange zest! The zest actually provides the majority of the citrus flavor, so don’t skip it! I use my handy zester, which makes the process fly by.
Tip: I often recommend against using the smallest holes of a cheese grater. Many of these are duller than zesters, so you don’t get nearly as much of the peel… Which means the orange flavor won’t be nearly as strong. I highly recommend buying a zester like this, and they’re really affordable!
Bonus Tip: Totally unrelated to healthy orange poppy seed scones… But did you know that you can use a zester for garlic too, instead of dicing it finely with a knife? So much faster and easier!
But now… Back to these scones…
With your orange zest now whisked into your flour mixture, you’ll cut in a small amount of very cold butter. Whereas traditional scones call for around ½ cup, if not more, you just need 2 tablespoons for these healthy ones. That really helps keep your healthy orange poppy seed scones low fat and low calorie!
Just remember, it’s extremely important to use very cold butter. Straight from the fridge is fine—no need to freeze it! When the butter in your scones melts in the oven, it creates tender little pockets in the dough. This is why you don’t want your butter to soften or melt ahead of time. You’ll miss out on that irresistibly moist and tender texture!
Tip: This is why I strongly recommend against coconut oil. Coconut oil melts at a much lower temperature compared to butter, which means it’ll start to soften as you mix together the dough… And therefore, you won’t get quite the same tender texture. See the Notes section of this healthy orange poppy seed scones recipe for my vegan version!
You’ll skip the heavy cream or whole milk often used in traditional scone recipes, and you’ll use Greek yogurt instead. Greek yogurt adds the same moisture as heavy cream or whole milk (or additional butter!) but for a fraction of the calories. It also gives your healthy orange poppy seed scones a protein boost!
Time for the second orange component: freshly squeezed orange juice! Although the zest provides the majority of that bright sunshiny flavor, the juice does add a bit… And it also adds natural sweetness to your healthy orange poppy seed scones!
Then to boost the natural sweetness, you’ll also mix in pure maple syrup. You want the kind that comes directly from maple trees! Check the bottle. The only ingredient should be “pure maple syrup!” It generally comes in thin glass bottles or squat plastic jugs (like this!).
Before you bake the dough, you’ll flatten it into a ¾”-tall circle and brush the tops and sides with milk. This seals moisture into the dough, and it also creates a hint of a crust on the outside. I love that subtle texture contrast!
You’ll also slice the dough into 8 triangles. No need to separate the wedges! Just make sure your cuts go all the way through the dough. By leaving their sides touching, it keeps both their sides and insides supremely moist and tender.
Then if you want to make your healthy orange poppy seed scones look a little prettier, you can add a sweet drizzle on top! It’s totally optional (I omit it half the time so I can eat the scones that much faster!), but I do think it adds a nice finishing touch. Don’t you?
The drizzle is really simple to make! Just stir together confectioners’ style erythritol (I buy mine online here!) and more freshly squeezed orange juice. Add that to a small zip-topped bag, cut off a tiny piece of one corner, and drizzle it all over your healthy orange poppy seed scones!
Then enjoy every last crumb of your delicious breakfast treat! And when you make your own, remember to snap a picture and share it on Instagram using #amyshealthybaking and tagging @amyshealthybaking IN the photo itself! (That guarantees I’ll see your picture! ?) I’d love to see your healthy orange poppy seed scones!
| Healthy Orange Poppy Seed Scones | | Print |
- for the scones
- 1 ½ cups (180g) white whole wheat flour or gluten-free* flour (measured like this)
- 4 tsp poppy seeds
- 1 ½ tsp baking powder
- ¼ tsp salt
- 1 ½ tbsp (12g) orange zest (about 1 large)
- 2 tbsp (28g) unsalted butter, cold and cubed
- ½ cup (120g) plain nonfat Greek yogurt
- 3 tbsp (45mL) pure maple syrup
- 3 tbsp (45mL) freshly squeezed orange juice (see Notes!)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 tsp nonfat milk
- for the drizzle
- 5 tsp confectioners’ style erythritol
- 1 – 1 ½ tsp freshly squeezed orange juice
- Preheat the oven to 425°F, and line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat or parchment paper.
- To prepare the scones, whisk together the flour, poppy seeds, baking powder, and salt. Whisk in the orange zest. Cut in the butter with a pastry cutter (highly recommended!) or the back of a fork until the mixture resembles fine crumbs. Make a well in the center. Add in the Greek yogurt, maple syrup, orange juice, and vanilla. Stir until just incorporated.
- Transfer the dough to the prepared baking sheet. Using a spatula, shape the dough into a ¾” tall circle, and brush with the milk. Slice the dough circle into 8 triangular segments with a sharp knife. (No need to separate them!) Bake at 425°F for 23-25 minutes, or until the tops are deeply golden. Cool on the pan for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.
- Just before serving, prepare the drizzle by stirring together the confectioners’ style erythritol and orange juice in a small bowl. Transfer the mixture to a zip-topped bag, cut off a tiny piece of one corner, and drizzle on top of the cooled scones.
For a gluten-free version, use the following blend: 1 cup (120g) millet flour, ¼ cup (30g) tapioca flour, ¼ cup (30g) brown rice flour, and 1 teaspoon xanthan gum. Most store-bought gluten-free flour blends (like this one!) will work as well, if they’re measured like this.
Remember to measure the flour correctly, using this method or a kitchen scale. (← That’s the one I own and love!) Too much will dry out your scones and make the dough crumbly.
Don’t skip or skimp on the orange zest! It actually provides the majority of the citrus flavor. I love my handy (and totally affordable!) zester. It works much better than the smallest holes of a cheese grater!
It’s very important that your butter is cold, straight from the fridge. (Freezing it isn’t necessary for this recipe!) With very cold butter, it won’t heat up until you put the scones in the extremely hot oven, and it will create little air pockets and a very tender crumb when it melts.
Honey or agave may be substituted in place of the pure maple syrup.
Any milk may be substituted for the nonfat milk.
As written, these scones aren’t overly sweet. If you prefer sweeter scones, substitute an additional 1-2 tablespoons of pure maple syrup for an equal amount of orange juice. (They won’t have as strong of a orange flavor though!)
In a pinch, coconut oil may be substituted for the butter, but the texture of the scones will be affected. Very cold butter is required to achieve their tender texture, and since coconut oil melts at a much lower temperature, the results will not be the same. Instead, I recommend the vegan version below!
For a vegan version, I recommend Earth Balance sticks in place of the butter, your preferred non-dairy yogurt in place of the Greek yogurt, and non-dairy milk in place of the nonfat milk.
In the drizzle, I buy my confectioners’ style erythritol online here. In a pinch, regular confectioners’ (powdered) sugar may be substituted for the confectioners’ style erythritol. However, regular powdered sugar is more absorbent, so start with ½ teaspoon of orange juice and add more as necessary to achieve the desired consistency.
If you’d like to fully coat your scones with the drizzle instead, you definitely can! Just make 3-4 times the amount of drizzle, and dip the tops of your scones directly into the bowl instead of transferring the glaze to a plastic bag and snipping off the corner.
When refrigerating leftover scones that have already been drizzled, the drizzle will turn brittle and crack if made with erythritol, or it will dissolve into the scones if made with powdered sugar. Neither will affect the flavor—only the appearance!
{gluten-free, clean eating, low fat, vegan option}
View Nutrition Information + Weight Watchers Points
You may also like Amy’s other recipes…
♡ Healthy Cranberry Orange Oatmeal Muffins
♡ Healthy Orange Bundt Cake
♡ Healthy Cranberry Orange Scones
♡ Healthy Orange Poppy Seed Cake
♡ The Ultimate Healthy Cranberry Orange Muffins
♡ …and the rest of Amy’s healthy scone recipes!
Dear Amy …. yet another lovely recipe, your Orange Poppy Seed Scones were fabulous … just the thing to bake on a snowy, frosty afternoon here in Southern England. Your treats are entirely responsible for keeping me on my new eating program … I’m not even ‘going there’ with calling it a diet. Just a quick mention for an Australian healthy eating chef called Teresa Cutter. I’ve recently come across her …. she reminds me a lot of you. Which reminds me … you should have a book deal! Love to you and your favourite waiter, who I have a secret girl crush on x Sally x
You’re so sweet Sally!! I’m so glad you loved these scones too. It truly means the world to me that you’ve been trying so many of my recipes! 🙂 I love what you said about not calling it a diet, but rather an eating program. So wise! (And I actually do have a cookbook here, if you’re interested! I’m hoping to publish another one in the future too!)
Oh my goodness, Amy! I love these!! I have always really enjoyed orange poppy seed muffins and I would have never thought about trying this flavour in a scone!
I just want to say that, having discovered your site a couple of months ago, I am soooooo impressed with your lovely, healthy recipes! You are so clever! Last year I started clean-eating and I have been looking for recipes that allow me to make (and freeze!) yummy treats — things that make me feel like I’m not depriving myself. 😉 I am gradually stocking my freezer with your baked treats (So far, I have apple cinnamon muffins, chocolate pancakes and these beautiful scones).
Thanks for sharing your knowledge and for all the hard work you put into this fabulous site! (Also, I love the little stories you share as you introduce each new recipe!!)
Best wishes and many thanks,
Tanya.
PS. You have opened my eyes to the wonders of non-fat Greek yoghurt!! 🙂
I’m so excited that you loved these scones Tanya! It truly means the world to me that you’ve tried and enjoyed so many of my recipes. My heart is about to burst — I can’t believe you have three of my recipes in your freezer! Wow!! What a sweet and special compliment that is — thank you!! 🙂 I’m so honored that you like the stories I share with each recipe too. Thank you for sharing that with me! ♡ (And Greek yogurt is such a miracle ingredient in healthier baking, isn’t it?? 😉 )
Awww, Amy, thanks so much for your lovely response! I’m so very happy to be able to give you this feedback and my heartfelt thanks. <3 Your recipes are helping me stay on track with healthy eating and it’s so exciting to learn to bake good, nutritious snacks from scratch! I’ve also tried your Ultimate Healthy Gingerbread Cookies and your Ultimate Healthy Crunchy Chocolate Chip Cookies – both of which I adored! In fact, I’m going to remake these and freeze some too (so that I have a good selection of healthy snacks to take to work 😉 ). You’ve even inspired me to purchase a PROPER (Microplane) zester and some incredients I haven’t tried before (such as liquid vanilla stevia and ethrythritol).
I live in Newcastle, Australia, and I’m spreading the word to friends and family about your excellent site. I’ll keep in touch as I try even more of your recipes. My next adventure will be your Healthy Fudgy Dark Chocolate Nut Brownies… As a chocoholic and brownie lover, I can’t wait!
Big hugs and many thanks,
Tanya.
Your sweet comment made my entire day Tanya! Thank you SO much!! ♡ I’m so incredibly honored that you’ve tried and loved that many of my recipes, as well as invested in tools and ingredients that I’ve recommended to make them. I’m truly grateful that you trust me, my recipes, and my guidance — and shared my site with your friends and family! Wow!! You’re such a gem Tanya! Thank you, thank you, thank you!! 🙂 And I’m so excited to hear what you think of the brownies too!
These turned out nice! I like the flavor. I made 4x the recipe again, using hard red wheat, full fat greek yogurt, and 2% milk… and the only problem I ran into was that the 23 minutes in the oven was a bit too long for a proper golden browning. So the first batch came out overdone (dark brown, but not black thankfully). 19-20 minutes in the oven worked best for me. These make nice bites to pull out of the freezer! I like that they’re not as sweet as some of the last recipes I tried.
Oh, and I did not make any of the icing to go with them.
I’m so glad you enjoyed these scones Marianna! That means a lot to me! 🙂 Do you have a convection-style (fan assisted) oven, by any chance? The baking temperature for convection ovens typically need to be reduced by about 25°F compared to what my recipes state; if baked at the same temperature, the baked goods often turn out overdone or burnt. I’m wondering if that’s what happened to your first batch!
Lol, well we do (and it’s a newer double oven)… but I haven’t gotten familiar with it enough to use that setting. I still use the normal bake setting when I cook. The second oven doesn’t even have that option, and it threatened to do the same… so I’m pretty sure that’s not what happened here. (Besides, if I had tried to use it, the oven would have automatically knocked the temperature down 25 degrees.) Thanks for thinking of the possibility, though. 🙂
It’s my pleasure, Marianna! Always happy to help. 🙂
I cant wait to try these, but I was wondering could I replace poppy seed with chia seed or will that throw the recipe off?
I really appreciate your interest in my recipe Chantel! I typically don’t recommend substituting chia seeds for poppy seeds. This is because chia seeds absorb moisture (poppy seeds don’t!), which can often result in dried out baked goods. I’d love to hear what you think of these scones if you decide to try them!
Do you think I can substitute any type of yogurt that I have at home?
Yes, that should be perfectly fine! I can’t wait to hear what you think of these scones Nicole! 🙂
These were really good! I was confused by the part of the recipe that said to divide the dough in two and then to cut each circle into 8 segments since the serving size for the recipe is 8. I had made the lemon poppyseed scones on the same day and that recipe did not say to divide it in two, however, measurements were almost completely similar. I ended up just making one circle with this dough and I was happy with the results! I will definitely be making these again!
I’m so glad you liked these scones, Kally! That’s the best kind of compliment if you already think you’ll make them again. Thank you for taking the time to let me know! 🙂 And thanks for catching that typo as well! I had been thinking about my copycat petite vanilla bean scones recipe when I was typing up the instructions for this one, so I accidentally typed out how to make these scones the same petite size. I’m so sorry about the confusion! I just updated the instructions for this recipe. The baking time was correct, at the very least, and now the scone size is correct too! 😉