English muffins. How hard can it be to make them? Let me count the ways. You won’t be bored, I promise!
Batch #1 was straight outta the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook. We’ll call that one The BHG. Used our 3.5” biscuit cutter. Easy peasy without a huge time commitment, but they didn’t rise much and were a wee bit small for the egg sausage (or bacon) breakfast sandwiches that hubby likes to make. Also, there wasn’t much in the way of Nooks and Crannies, an important feature of EMs. By the way, you don’t bake these, you cook them on a griddle.
In search of a better recipe I went down the rat hole of google searching. Everyone thinks their recipe is the best. It would be refreshing to have someone say, “My recipe is fairly average, but everyone in my family likes it.” I checked Pinterest and YouTube as well. Overwhelmed by all the possibilities I chose one almost at random from Preppy Kitchen (PK).
Batch #2, The PK. The recipe was much fussier with more ingredients and took more time. I used one of our nice goblets (Grandma Lois’s) to get a larger diameter of 4 inches. The dough was hard to handle, the EM’s were sky high and expanded a bit while rising. I couldn’t get them to cook all the way through on the griddle and had to finish them in the oven. Decided to purchase a 4-inch cutter for the next batch. Discovered in my researches that the best way to open an EM is to insert a fork into the middle and go around the edge that way. Works like a charm!
Batch #3, Return of The BHG (not to be confused with Revenge of the BHG). Let’s review the definition of insanity: repeating the same actions and expecting different results. I thought I could improve upon the performance of The BHG which was so much simpler to make. The only difference to the final product was that these were even more like hockey pucks than the first batch. Hubby valiantly ate them anyway. Maybe it really was Revenge of the BHG.
Batch #4, Return of The PK. I was older and wiser by now and resigned to the idea that excellence was going to take more time and effort. I knew how to avoid the perils of the past and press on toward the goal of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Oops – sorry. Something in that sentence triggered one of my Bible memory verses. Progress was made. The final muffins were 5” in diameter, somewhat monstrously large in comparison to the store bought ones. My husband suggested they should be called “English Empire Muffins.” But they weren’t too high and I figured out a better way to cook them on the griddle without finishing them in the oven.
Voila!
What? You were bored? Oh dear. Perhaps “promise” was too strong a word.
Brought to you by the Kitchen Bee (closely related to Lynniebee). (Very closely.)
I’ll probably use a fork to break this post open in the morning.
Lynniebeemuseoday 