Chocolate Chip Scones

Chocolate chip scones are the breakfast pastries I have in constant rotation. They are perfect year-round and are soft, tender, and packed with chocolate chips!

These chocolate chip scones are the ones I come back to whenever I want something that feels indulgent but is genuinely straightforward to execute. The dough comes together fast, the technique is forgiving, and the result is a tall, flaky scone with chocolate in every single bite!

If you bake scones regularly, you already know how much the method matters. My blueberry scones and raspberry white chocolate scones (coming soon!) use the same foundational approach. Once you master this recipe, you can make all the scone variations you want!

Ingredients & Substitutions

• All-Purpose Flour: Provides the structure for the scone without making it tough, as long as you stop mixing before the dough fully develops.
• Sugar: Adds sweetness and helps the exterior brown during baking. Granulated white sugar is what I use; raw cane sugar works as a direct swap.
• Kosher Salt
• Baking Powder: Provides the lift that gives these scones their height. Make sure yours is fresh: a teaspoon stirred into hot water should bubble immediately.
• Unsalted Butter: Cold butter is the most critical ingredient in this dough. The fat needs to stay in distinct pieces so it steams during baking, creating that tender melt-in-your-mouth texture. I always cube mine and return it to the freezer for ten minutes before I start, which is my go-to move with any scone dough, including these lemon scones.
• Vanilla Extract: Feel free to use any extract of your choosing; almond, coffee, and peppermint would all be great options to change the flavor profile of these scones.
• Eggs
• Heavy Cream: Used twice in this recipe: once in the dough for richness and moisture, and again as a finishing wash before baking to seal the surface and deepen the crust. Do not substitute half-and-half or milk in the dough itself; the fat content matters for tenderness.
• Chocolate Chips: Use whatever you have on hand: semisweet, bittersweet, or a combination, all work well. Miniature chips distribute more evenly through the dough; standard chips give you those bigger pockets of chocolate.
• White Sparkling Sugar (for finishing): Sprinkled over the cream-washed dough just before baking for a crunchy, caramelized top. Turbinado sugar is a direct substitute; granulated sugar will dissolve more and give less crunch.

See the recipe card for full information on ingredients and quantities.

Variations on This Chocolate Chip Scones

• Add a glaze. Use this donut glaze recipe, the cream cheese glaze from these carrot cake scones, or for a deeper chocolate hit, drizzle chocolate fudge glaze over the cooled scones.
• Change the mix in! Go in a completely different direction and replace the chocolate chips with butterscotch chips, as I do these butterscotch chews or make these cinnamon scones. Let me know in the comments how they turn out!
• Make them with fruit! Dried or fresh fruit, there are many ways to add fruit to your scones. Try these apple scones for a dried variation or these strawberry scones for some fresh fruit!

Professional Tips

• Reserve some chocolate chips for the top. Before you cut the dough, set aside a small handful of chips and press them onto the surface of each scone. This is what guarantees visible chocolate on every piece, rather than having all of it buried inside, which is something I landed on after a few batches where the tops looked completely bare.
• Chill the cut dough before baking. The scones need to be fully cold before they go into the oven, about 2 hours in the refrigerator. Cold dough means the butter stays solid longer, which drives the rise and flaky layers. If you are working ahead, the cut dough freezes well and bakes from frozen without any adjustment.
• Do not overbake. Pull the scones when the edges are golden, and the centers give just a little resistance under a gentle press. If the center feels firm, they are already past done. The oven temperature for this recipe is 325°F, which is lower than most scone recipes, so give them the full time without rushing.
• Finish with the course sugar. Brush with cream first, then sprinkle the coarse sugar immediately so it adheres before the cream dries. Granulated sugar will work in a pinch, but it dissolves into the surface rather than staying crunchy, and that crunch on top is one of my favorite parts of this whole recipe.

How to Make Chocolate Chip Scones

This recipe comes together quickly, but the chill time before baking is non-negotiable, so plan for about 2 hours in the refrigerator before your scones go in the oven.

Step 1: Mix the dry ingredients. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder. Mix just enough to distribute everything evenly; you are not developing any structure here, just bringing the dry ingredients together.

Step 2: Cut in the cold butter. Add the cold, cubed butter and mix on low. Continue mixing until the butter is no longer visible and the mixture resembles wet sand. This is the texture you are looking for: pale, slightly clumping, with no large chunks remaining.

If your kitchen is warm and you can feel the dough heating up as you mix, stop and refrigerate the bowl for 10 minutes before continuing. Warm butter means flat, dense scones.

Step 3: Blend the wet ingredients. While the butter is being cut in, combine the heavy cream, eggs, and vanilla in a separate bowl. Use an immersion blender to blend until completely smooth and uniform. This ensures the eggs are fully broken up and evenly distributed before they hit the flour.

If you do not have an immersion blender, a whisk works fine; just make sure there are no streaks of egg white remaining.

Step 4: Add the wet ingredients to the dry. With the mixer running on low, slowly pour the cream mixture into the flour mixture. Mix only until almost incorporated; you will still see a few dry streaks at the bottom of the bowl, which is completely normal. The dough will look shaggy and uneven at this point, and that is exactly where you want to stop the mixer. Overworking the dough here develops gluten and toughens the scones.

Step 5: Finish the dough by hand and fold in the chocolate chips. Dump the dough out onto a dry surface and knead it together gently until only a few dry spots remain. Once the dough is just holding together, gently fold in the chocolate chips. Finishing by hand gives you the control to get the chips evenly distributed without overworking the dough.

Step 6: Shape and cut the scones. Press the dough out into a circle of about ½ inch thickness. Using a bench scraper or pastry cutter, cut the dough into 12 sections.

Step 7: Chill the dough completely. Transfer the cut scones to a parchment-lined sheet pan and refrigerate for at least 2 hours before baking. You can also wrap the tray tightly and freeze the scones at this point; they bake beautifully from frozen with just a few extra minutes in the oven.

Step 8: Preheat the oven and finish the scones. Preheat the oven to 325°F. Once the scones are fully chilled, brush each one generously with heavy cream and sprinkle with turbinado sugar.

The cream gives the scones a golden, lacquered finish and helps lock in moisture during baking. The turbinado sugar adds a light crunch on top that I love; it is one of those small details that makes a real difference in the finished scone.

Step 9: Bake until golden and just set. Bake the scones for about 15 minutes, or until the edges are golden brown, the tops are puffed, and the centers offer a little resistance when you press them gently. If they feel firm under your finger, they have gone too far. You can also insert a cake tester into the center; it should come out clean, with no wet dough clinging to it. Start checking at 12 minutes, since ovens vary, and these go from perfectly done to overdone faster than you would expect.

Step 10: Cool and serve. Let the scones cool on the baking sheet, or eat them warm straight from the oven. Sometimes I will re-warm mine for a few minutes so the chocolate chips are just slightly melted again, which is honestly one of the better things about this recipe.

Recipe FAQs

Before You Go

These chocolate chip scones, with their crisp, sugar-dusted tops and tender, buttery crumb, are worth making on repeat. Find more morning baking in Breakfast Recipes or Dessert Recipes.