These Orange Scones are crisp on the outside and tender on the inside and full of sweet orange flavor! Free from gluten, dairy, eggs, and sugar for a perfect Paleo, Vegan & Keto-friendly breakfast, snack or dessert!
Scones: a Family Tradition
My official title, bestowed upon me by my family many years ago, is The Duchess of Scones. There's a fact you probably didn't know about me lol! And no, I'm not British, ha.
My family has a thing about scones. It started out on a family vacation... maybe 15 years ago when we went to Florida, and there was this quaint little restaurant that served scones. We affectionately named it "Scone City." They were melt-in-your-mouth DELISH. Since then, we've been hooked and we make them at every family gathering. It's a tradition.
Fast forward to the past few years, and now, the ingredients in traditional scones -- flour, butter, eggs, cream and sugar: I don't eat anymore!
So needless to say, I miss my dear scones!! I made a declaration at Christmas to do a scone makeover. Using healthy, whole-food ingredients & I DID IT!
Do they taste exactly like my dad's (The KING of Scones) classic butter scones? No. But that's ok because I still LOVE them. They're firm and crisp on the outside and tender and soft on the inside. Yum.
It's basically an excuse to eat cookies for breakfast! 😀 And it's perfectly acceptable. They're wholesome!
These scones are actually protein and fiber-rich and have only one gram of sugar! They keep me full and satisfied and oh so HAPPY to be eating scones again 🙂 
Paleo Vegan baking is TRICKY
Let's be real. Gluten-Free, Grain-Free, and Egg-Free baking is hard. It's *not* a simple swap of flours 1:1. It's a whole other ball game.
That's why I knew I needed the help of an expert. Enter 24 Carrot Kitchen. She's a Paleo baking QUEEN. I found her recipe for Cranberry Orange Scones and knew I could tweak it to fit my dietary restrictions.
And it worked! Her recipe is FAB, but it does contain quite a bit of carbs (starches), plus eggs and refined sugar. I knew my stomach would not be happy with it.
So I worked some magic and made these vegan and keto friendly in addition to Paleo. YAY.
How to Make these Egg-Free
If you look closely, you'll see the little brown flecks inside these scones. That's the ground flaxseed. It's used as an egg replacer to hold these scones together.
How to make flax egg: Stir together flax and water before mixing anything else. Let it sit for about 5 minutes to thicken.
Where to find flax: Ground flaxseed can be found at many grocery stores now. I buy it at Aldi, but I also saw it at Target recently.
Tip 1: if you buy ground instead of whole flaxseeds, store it in the freezer so it doesn't go rancid.
Tip 2: Brown flax has a better flavor than golden (it's more mild). But if you use golden flax, your scones look prettier lol. Your choice.
To make them rise without eggs: To ensure these scones didn't turn into hockey pucks, I added in an extra teaspoon of baking powder for levity. Worked great! These puffed up nicely.
ps if you don't have flax, you can replace the flax egg with a regular egg. 
How to Make Low-Carb & Sugar Free Scones
THIS is the easy part, thanks to Lakanto Monkfruit! Their sweeteners ARE actually a 1:1 swap for sugar and maple syrup.
I used Lakanto Maple flavored syrup inside the scones and powdered monkfruit for the GLAZE (and oh my word the glaze is the BEST!)
If you don't have powdered monkfruit, don't worry because I don't either! My favorite kitchen hack is to make my OWN powdered sugar. It works with any granulated sweetener including Lakanto classic sweetener.
Simply put some monkfruit in a small blender and blitz it for about 10 seconds until it's all a powder. SO stinkin' simple!
*Note that you need to blend at least ⅓ cup granules at a time for it to blend properly (it needs to cover the blade.. at least it does on my Ninja blender) But you can save the leftover powdered sugar for other delicious treats, like my favorite FROSTING. (I could eat this whole batch with a SPOON lol)
How to Save Money on Ingredients
Monkfruit isn't cheap, but I found a way to get it at a huge discount: Thrive Market! It's my latest obsession. A destination for healthy foods and so much more.
Everything on the site is discounted 20-50% AND they gave me a discount to share with my readers!
I buy all my flours on Thrive Market now: almond, tapioca, coconut. All my sweeteners. All my coconut milk. I love it!
You even get to choose a free gift with your order. Yay for free stuff!
Are you ready to get baking? These scones are so easy to make. I even recorded a video about them over on Instagram (saved in my highlights).
Do you want to see more breakfast recipes? More flavors of scones? Let me know in the comments 🙂
Click the image below to save this recipe on Pinterest:
Orange Scones (Paleo, Vegan, Low-Carb)
Ingredients
Scones
- 1 ⅔ cups fine almond flour
- 1 ½ Tbs tapioca flour - or more almond flour
- 2 teaspoon baking powder - or 1 ⅓ teaspoon cream of tartar + ⅔ teaspoon baking soda
- ⅛ teaspoon pink salt
- 3 ½ Tbs coconut oil - melted
- 2 Tbs ground flaxseed + 3 Tbs water
- 2 ½ Tbs lakanto monkfruit maple syrup - or pure maple syrup for non low-carb
- 1 Tbs orange zest (one whole orange)
- 2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 7 drops orange essential oil - optional
Sugar-Free Orange Glaze
- 3 Tbs powdered monkfruit - see notes
- 2-3 teaspoon freshly squeezed orange juice - or water + 1 drop orange oil
Instructions
To make the scones:
- Preheat oven to 350. Line a medium baking sheet with parchment paper.
- In a small dish, stir together flax and water and set aside to thicken.
- Meanwhile, combine dry ingredients in a medium mixing bowl.
- Whisk together the wet ingredients in another bowl. Pour wet over dry and mix well. Allow flour to absorb for a few minutes. If too sticky, add about 1 teaspoon of almond flour at a time until a soft dough forms. If too dry/crumbly, add a splash of water or oj.
- Place ball of dough on parchment and flatten into a disc about 8" wide and 1" thick. Slice into 8 triangles and separate about 1-2" apart.
- Bake for about 15 minutes until golden and crisp on the outside. Cool for 5 minutes before adding glaze.
To make the glaze:
- Make powdered monkfruit if needed (see notes)
- Add monkfruit to a small bowl and add 1 teaspoon freshly squeezed orange juice at time until a pourable consistency is reached.
- Drizzle glaze over the scones. Sprinkle with additional orange zest. ENJOY 🙂
Brenda Holenstein
I'm gonna try these! Love scones but I'm doing keto now. Do you have a recipe for pumpkin scones (using pure canned pumpkin)
Emily
This was my first scone recipe so I don't have any other flavors-- yet! What you could probably do is swap the maple syrup for pumpkin purée, and add ~2-3 Tbs monkfruit granules to sweeten + ~1-2 tsp pumpkin pie spice, to taste 🙂 If you try it, let me know how they turn out!
Susan
Is there a good substitute for almond flour?
Emily
I use [eafl id="12475" name="pumpkin seed flour" text="pumpkin seed flour"] and it works as a 1:1 replacement. It has a slightly nutty flavor but I like it. I buy it on Amazon 🙂 I have an almond-free scone recipe in my cookbook, PS It’s Healthy, too. It uses cashew flour.
Hope that helps.
Christine Galvani
Oh, these scones look amazing and I'd love to try this version! Gorgeous photos too!
Emily
Thanks! And thank you for the recipe inspiration so I could make a low carb & vegan version
Claudia
I have orange extract, can it be used as a substitute for the orange essential oil?
Emily
Yes that should work 🙂
Sheila Collins
I'm definitely going to make these. It's a great recipe. Question: can baking soda be subbed for baking powder?
Emily
Yes, if you add cream of tartar to the baking soda (essentially making homemade baking powder)
3/4 tsp baking soda + 1.5 tsp cream of tartar = 2 tsp baking powder
Also I would probably leave out the salt or salt only to taste.
If you make them, let me know how it goes Hope you enjoy
Sheila Collins
Thank you, Emily. I actually bought some baking powder so I'm all set on that. Not sure I'll be able to find monk fruit sweetener but I do have both maple syrup and agave nectar (one or the other for the inside?) and could probably find coconut sugar for the outside. I'm hoping those subs will work, as well.
Emily
Yes! Maple syrup is a 1:1 sub for monk fruit syrup, and powdered coconut sugar works great for a glaze, too. You can make it powdered by blending it in a small blender for 10 seconds 🙂 Hope you enjoy! Let me know how it goes
Lindsey Shipman
What if I don't do any syrup don't even have sugar free syrup!?! What could I sub with??
I was planning on making these for breakfast tomorrow morning
Emily
I would use my classic scone recipe and add orange zest and the the glaze 🙂 https://PrettyPies.com/classic-scones
Or with this recipe, sub the syrup for coconut/almond milk + a pinch of pure stevia powder or monkfruit drops or extract to taste.
Let me know if you have any questions. Hope that helps!
Sue L.
I didn’t have any orange essential oil so I added some vegan chocolate chips. They turned out great! Very delicious!
Emily
Oh yay! Glad you liked them!
Candie Takacs
I would like to use an egg instead of the flaxseed option; your recipe says 2 T ground flaxseed plus 3 T water. Is that comparable to one egg?
thanks! I am excited to try this recipe and look forward to more scone options like blueberry or lemon
Emily
Hi! One egg is 1 Tbs flax + 3 Tbs water. I use 2 Tbs flax for extra thickening and binding. You could do 1 egg + 1 Tbs flax or if you don’t have any flax, you may be able to use a little bit of another flour just so the dough mixture isn’t too wet.
Let me know if you try it 🙂 Hope you enjoy!