English Muffins

My family was up coming up for Christmas morning so my Brother and I decided to make brunch.  I was responsible for the baked goods, which included bread, cinnamon rolls, and my first attempt at English Muffins.

Once again I am headed back to one of my best resources for baking “The Bread Makers Apprentice”.  This book has everything bread related, I am still amazed every time I go to look something up and it’s in there.

This book is definitely worth picking up!

The Ingredients:

• 2-1/4 Cups King Arthur Bread Flour
• 1/2 Tablespoon Sugar
• 3/4 Teaspoon Salt
• 1-1/4 Teaspoon Bread Machine Yeast
• 1 Tablespoon Softened Butter
• 3/4 Cup Milk, adding more if needed to get a soft dough, not sticky
• A Dusting of Cornmeal

The Process:

All dry ingredients go into your mixing bowl, with the paddle attachment on your mixer.  After mixing all the dry ingredients add all the butter and slowly add the milk.  Once the dough is well combined switch over to the dough hook and knead for 10 minutes.  Like always the dough needs to be tacky but not sticky.  Use additional flour if needed, adding a small amount at a time.

After kneading remove the ball from the mixing bowl and spray the bowl with a cooking spray and toss the dough ball back in the bowl, making sure to coat it with some of the oil.  Cover with plastic wrap and sit it on the counter for the proverbial 1-2 hours for the first rise.

Once doubled in size, transfer the dough to the counter and cut into 6 equal portions.  I shaped the pieces into little boules and transferred them onto a cookie sheet with parchment paper that had been lightly dusted with cornmeal.  I hit the tops of the boules with spray oil, and sprinkled the tops with cornmeal as well.  I covered the cookie sheet with plastic wrap and let them rise for another hour or so.

For cooking I did two muffins at a time.  Pre heat your oven to 350F and line a 2nd cookie sheet with parchment.  Once the oven is preheated you are ready to start grilling the muffins.  Heat a frying pan to medium low heat, spray some cooking spray in the pan, and cook muffins for 5-8 minutes a side, until they get that traditional English muffin burn mark on them.  Once both sides are grilled put them on a cookie sheet and transfer into the oven to finish cooking for another 5-8 minutes.  I did mine closer to 5 minutes in the oven, because they were starting to brown, there is no real test on this one.  Repeat the process.

The muffins turned out great. They tasted just like Thomas’s English Muffins, with one exception.  My muffins were at least twice the thickness of a traditional muffin.  That’s a problem that could be easily be solved in the shaping process.  Instead of boules I would try shaping them a little flatter next time.  Make sure you fork split the English muffins for the great nooks and cranneys before toasting them up.