English Muffins again (12 years later!)

August 13, 2023 - 7:46pm

rgreenberg2000

English Muffins again (12 years later!)

Looking to expand my repertoire with something less loafy, so thought I'd give English Muffins a go again after THIS ATTEMPT about 12 years ago! :) I'm much happier with the results on these, which I will humbly chalk up to my gaining a bit of dough handling and reading experience in the intervening years! :)

I was drooling over kjnits EM recipe, but really wanted to keep this dairy free (a bit of lactose intolerance in the house.) I borrowed/stole from a few recipes I found and came up with this:

Bread Flour 70%

AP Flour 17%

Whole Wheat Flour (freshly milled) 13%

Honey 1%

Butter 2% (I know, dairy?? Funny thing is I forgot to even put this in!!!)

Water 73%

Salt 1.7%

Levain 23%

I mixed everything together by hand with a brief knead after mixing, then let it rest for about 20 minutes. Next I did a sort of stretch/slap fold procedure that I probably can't do justice describing, but has become my go-to method until I got some good strength. Performed 2 sets of coil folds over the next hour, then a cold bulk for the better part of 24 hours.

Today, I divided the dough into 145g balls (thought I was making pizza for a second....small pizza), then let those rise on cornmeal dusted parchment until puffy (which was about 2.5-3 hours today as it was warm!) I cooked the muffins off in a CI skillet that was ~340° per my IR thermo for 6-7 minutes per side, finishing them in a 350° oven until they hit 208-210° internal temp.

I let them cool, fork split them, and was VERY pleased with the interior crumb! My prior attempt had a much more closed and doughy interior. Taste testing says that they need more like 1.9-2.0% salt, and that the honey doesn't add much, so I'll either up that a bit, or just use white sugar.

Anyway, I'm super happy with the direction on these, and plan to make another batch on Wednesday!

Happy baking to you all!

Rich

tpassin

August 13, 2023 - 8:42pm

Nice looking muffins.I make

Nice looking muffins.

I make sourdough English muffins too, and also finish them in the oven. I find that 5 minutes at 250 deg F (121 C) works well. Sometimes I put a little oil in the dough, sometimes I don't. Works either way.

One difference - I like them much smaller, and I scale the dough to 2 3/4 oz (78 g) per muffin. To me that's the ideal size.

For a different flavor profile, try replacing the whole wheat with masa harina, and use all bread flour for the rest to add back some of the missing gluten (masa harina is the lime-treated corn flour used in corn tortillas and some other Latin corn products). It brings a pleasant, subtly different taste.

I did try making them at 80% hydration once, but it's hard to tease them off the proofing surface and onto the griddle and keep their nice shape..

rgreenberg2000

August 14, 2023 - 3:09pm

Interesting

I may try your suggestion on the masa harina once I feel like I've got these tweaked. I do love to make corn tortillas, so that would be a nice blend! :)

Thanks!

Rich