English Muffins With Promise

I love English muffins.  (No surprise here, as I love bread . . .)  But as I live rather far from grocery stores, the times I have been able to buy them have been few and far between.  So I decided to try to make them.

The first recipe I tried worked fine, from a "did a successful bread result which resembles somewhat an English muffin" standpoint.  But the recipe did not result in exactly what I wanted, which was a spongy texture with nooks and crannies.  It was interesting to me in that I was cooking a twice-risen, cut-out yeast dough on a stovetop (which was a balancing act, temperature-wise), and it produced delicious bread.  But without the nice nooks and crannies, I felt something was missing.  It just didn't seem like an English muffin.

I posted this discouragement on Facebook one day, and a friend responded with a link which ultimately led to a recipe Alton Brown demonstrated at Food Network.  This recipe required some special equipment:  English muffin rings.  Wow . . . English muffin rings?  I had never heard of those.  (It said an alternative was to cut both ends off tuna cans, but all the tuna cans I found couldn't be opened on the bottom with a can opener . . .)  The next time my husband took me to lunch in a town with a cooking supply store, I discovered the coveted rings.

I dusted off the website and did some thinking.  The basic idea behind this recipe was very similar to the "no-knead" bread I had done before, except this recipe only required a 30-minute rising time, rather than 12 hours or so.  And yet, Thomas' used to advertise that their muffin dough spent 18 hours in rising.  (My husband reminded me of this when he listened to my description of the recipe and said, "It sounds like a pancake.")  I decided it was unlikely to hurt my results if I left the dough rising all night.  (And if it worked, the prep time in the morning would be just about nil.)

Unfortunately, the long rise version still didn't produce the results I wanted, so I reluctantly decided to go ahead and <sigh> follow the directions . . .

Actually, there were a couple of possible reasons for this . . . one being that I followed the directions too well in another area.  The recipe said to use 2 scoops of a #20 ice cream scoop for each muffin.  Well, exactly how big is a #20 ice cream scoop?  I have no idea, but all my ice cream scoops are about the same size, so I tried two scoops of that, which ended up being way too much batter per muffin.  Instead of ending up with 8-10 muffins, I ended up with 6, and that was only because the last two muffins were made with a single scoop each.

Accordingly, I tried again later on.  This time, I only rose the dough for a half hour (ok, a little longer, because I started out in a colder room, which wasn't very effective, then moved it to sit on the cooler part of my pellet stove, which the yeast really, really liked.)  And this time, I only put in about a scoop of dough, wiggling it around a little to allow it to fill the inside of the rings (on the bottom, anyway.)  Interestingly enough, the end size of the single-scoop muffins was fairly close to the end size of the double scoop ones (no wonder, considering a baking sheet was placed on top of them while cooking . . . the poor double scoop ones were smished and didn't have room to rise), but even more interesting, some of them resulted in reasonably decent crannies.

The most difficult part of the whole enterprise was again, the temperature.  My first group of muffins in the batch turned out much better than the next group, cranny-wise, which I attribute to the fact the griddle hadn't heated up quite as much.  I think I'm going to really have to turn down the griddle once it heats up, for the best results.  Also, when checking for crannies, really do wait for the muffins to cool.  (I know, it's hard . . . it's really hard, because you want to check the results immediately and see if you are doing it right.)  It just works better.

All in all, I like the recipe.  The texture was soft and spongy, the muffins toasted up nicely, and I sometimes did get crannies, which gives me hope I can eventually learn to produce a more consistent muffin.  No wonder Alton Brown recommended cooking them on an electric skillet!  (Too bad for those of us electric skillet-less people . . .)

So enough of the editorializing and on to the recipe!

Ingredients:

1/2 cup non-fat powdered milk (I didn't have this, so I used full-fat powdered milk.)

1 Tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon salt, divided (Half goes in the initial batter and half goes into the batter just before cooking.)

1 Tablespoon shortening

1 cup hot water

1 envelope dry yeast (with my yeast, a little under a Tablespoon)

1/8 teaspoon sugar

1/3 cup lukewarm water

2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted

Non-stick vegetable spray (I didn't have this, either.  My cookware had dire warnings on the box if I used spray, so I stopped buying it years ago.  I ended up using shortning, which was messier, but effective.)

In a bowl, combine the powdered milk, 1 Tablespoon of sugar, 1/2 teaspoon of salt, shortening, and hot water.  Stir until the sugar and salt are dissolved.  (The shortening does not need to melt.)  Let it cool.

In a separate bowl, combine the yeast, the 1/8 teaspoon sugar, and the 1/3 cup of lukewarm water and let it sit for about 5 minutes, until the yeast is dissolved.  Then add it to the powdered milk mixture.

Add the sifted flour and beat thoroughly with a wooden spoon.  (Nope!  Not using a stand mixer here.  Not necessary.)  Cover the bowl and let it rest in a warm spot for 30 minutes.

Preheat the griddle to 300 degrees Fahrenheit.  (Here's where it gets difficult for those of us having to use a stove.  Think sort of cooler medium griddle . . .)  Place the metal English muffin rings on the griddle and coat lightly with vegetable spray.  (I greased my rings before placing them on the griddle.)

Add the remaining 1/2 teaspoon of salt to the mixture and beat thoroughly.

Although the recipe did not call for it, I sprinkled cornmeal on my cooking surface.  Using a #20 ice cream scoop, place 2 scoops into each ring.  Cover with a pot lid or cookie sheet and cook for 5-6  minutes.  (I found my regular ice cream scoop worked fine, with only one scoop.  Grease the cookie sheet used to cover the rings.  Trust me.)



This picture is actually showing some with 2 scoops--too much batter.


Remove the lid and flip rings using tongs.  (Good luck keeping those muffins inside the rings if you do this only with tongs.  I used tongs and a spatula.)  Cover with the lid and cook for another 5-6 minutes or until golden brown.


I think my griddle was a little warm here.  The color came out darker.
And, yeah, too much batter . . .


Place the muffins on a cooling rack, remove the rings, and cool.  Split with a fork and serve.

The muffins in this last picture are from my second attempt, using only one scoop of batter, first batch cooked, when the temperature was still cooler.  You can see the color is not as dark as the others, but more importantly, look at the inside!  The texture is spongy, and there are plenty of places for melted butter to hide.  I still haven't perfected this, but I can see the light, and they are delicious enough for me to want to continue working on it.

From start to finish, including "resting" time, these only take about an hour, so it's a simple thing to whip some up in the evening and have them all ready to toast in the morning.  The hardest part is telling the kids they have to save them for breakfast.

Okregly Chleb Kartoflany

Nope, I can't pronounce it either.  It's a Polish potato bread.

This is one bread recipe I found by simply browsing recipes from around the world.  The deciding factor in my choice to make it right now was the large amount of leftover mashed potatoes in my refrigerator.

As my eldest daughter made the mashed potatoes this Thanksgiving, instead of me, they were especially well-suited to this purpose.  When I make mashed potatoes, I put in butter, milk, salt, pepper, and maybe garlic.  When she made the mashed potatoes, she put in a little butter and kept the whole thing rather dry.  (I resisted the urge to insist she make them my way.)  There were a lot left over, and the thought came to me while spooning it all into a container and putting it in the refrigerator that this would be the perfect opportunity to try out one of the many potato bread recipes I had found and bookmarked.  (I figured the negligible amount of butter in them wouldn't affect the recipes too much.)

This was the first one I found which gave me the measurements in terms of mashed potatoes, instead of in terms of potatoes.  <shrug>  Hey, it makes life easier.

The recipe, as written, only makes one loaf, but I doubled it when baking.  I figured if I was going to go through three rises and a 45-minute cooking time, I was going to make it more worth my while by at least making two loaves.  (Besides, it used up more of those mashed potatoes.)

Ingredients:

1/2 cup milk

1/2 cup mashed potatoes

3 Tablespoons sugar

2 Tablespoons butter, softened (I goofed here and used 3 Tablespoons.)

3 cups flour, divided

1 large egg, beaten

1 package active dry or instant yeast (about 2.25 teaspoons)  Do not use rapid rise yeast.

4 Tablespoons warm water

1 teaspoon salt

Scald the milk and place it in the bowl of a stand mixer.  Add the mashed potatoes, sugar, and butter, and mix by hand.

In the mean time, dissolve the yeast in the water and allow to sit for about 5 minutes.

When the milk mixture has cooled a bit, add 1 1/2 cups flour and the egg, mixing by hand until well combined.  (By hand?  Face it, the bowl of my stand mixer does not lend itself well to hand mixing. I used the regular beater of my mixer until well combined. )

Add the salt and the yeast mixture to the potato mixture and mix well.

Cover the bowl and let rise in a warm place for 1 1/2 hours.  (Yep, you read that right.)

It's actually rather amazing what happens to this soft mixture after 1 1/2 hours.  It rises, all right, but it's one step shy of being almost a liquid.  (If you jiggle the bowl, it swishes just a little.)  I believe this is called a "sponge".  My daughters had way too much fun jiggling the bowl and watching the dough move.

Remember, this batch is doubled, so the bowl is extra-full.

Place the bowl on the stand mixer and attach the bread hook.  Add that last 1 1/2 cups flour, mixing as you would normally for a yeast dough.

Place the dough in a greased bowl (twirl around and flip so the side of the dough exposed to the air is also greased.)  Cover it and allow it to rise until about doubled.  This took about a half hour for me in a warm location.

Punch down the dough, form it into a round loaf, and place it on a greased baking sheet.  Cover and let rise until about doubled.  (Again, about a half hour for me.)  In the mean time, preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.  (Yes, it is unusual to have a bread baking at this low a temperature.)

Before the rise.

With a sharp knife, cut a shallow "X" into the top of the loaf and sprinkle lightly with flour.

Sharpen your knife, or it won't cut risen dough well.

Bake in the preheated oven for 35-45 minutes.  For the giggles of it, I spritzed water into the oven when I put in the bread, because I felt like trying for an extra-yummy crust.  The original recipe says the bread is done when ". . . an instant-read thermometer reads 190 degrees."  I have never before used a thermometer on my bread, but, just in case there was a trick to this bread, I went ahead and checked it after 40 minutes, when the bread looked done to me.  No trick.  It was 190 degrees.  Next time, I won't bother to take the measurement.

As I removed the bread, I was almost overcome by the absolutely wonderful roll-your-eyes-in-the-back-of-your-head-in-ecstasy smell.  I tried to wait for it to cool--I really did--but the Senior Master Kitchen Helper (who had been dubious at the idea of mashed potatoes in bread) and I finally couldn't stand it anymore and decided we just had to see how it had turned out.

We couldn't stop with one slice.  The crust was crusty, the interior was extra-soft and fluffy, and the smell was decadent.  Good thing we made two loaves . . .

As far as I'm concerned, although it takes a little extra time, this recipe is definitely a keeper.  I feel sort of badly my husband is on travel and didn't get the chance to taste it, but that means I have the excuse to make it again soon.

Craving attack!!  Gotta go get another slice . . . be right back . . .