Delicious English muffins are full of all those nooks and crannies you love. A simple oven recipe to start your day with something special for breakfast.

Introduction and My Rating

This is my first recipe in several months after a complete remodel. The kitchen is not totally restocked. But this recipe has been high on my list.

As usual, I read many recipes, and honestly, for a simple thing like an English Muffin, they are all over the place. Some of the common things I didn’t like:

• The need for multiple muffin rings.
• The stovetop method; you are talking about standing at a stove for multiple batches at 15 to 30 minutes each. And then some recipes still required finishing in the oven.
• Some had lots of ingredients and steps. Not for me.
• Did I say I didn’t like the stovetop method and all the rings?

So I looked for an oven-baked method. There were several at King Arthur Flour, but they were variations of the same recipe, and the method struck me as needlessly complicated. It involved flipping hot trays over. Plus, some odd ingredients. I would injury myself.

There is a great discussion at Sheryl’s Blog about the history of English muffins, which are really American and related to English crumpets. She included some old cookbook references (that I read) and used “raise until it drops” method. Which is just mixing and letting it rise at room temperature overnight, and the rise will stop, and the dough will “fall in upon itself.” I liked the idea. It sounded great for nooks and crannies.

My Rating

A very nice breakfast treat. I’m between a 4 and a 5, but it is only a muffin.

👨‍🍳The Method

• Use the raise until it drops overnight rise method.
• No egg. Many recipes had an egg. Food safety first and always here. The egg sitting overnight at room temperature bothered me a lot. I know cooking would kill bacteria. But still…
• I needed a little dryer dough. All the recipes had a very moist dough. I wanted it to stand up enough not to make Peta bread and not need baking rings. I only had one.
• Preheat the baking tray with the oven to get better browning (it worked.)
• Cook to 200° internal temp.

✔️Tips

Never knead this dough.

Add a little cinnamon and raisins for a special treat.

If you like a thicker muffin, make six instead of eight.

These should freeze well. They should spoil in a few days, so if you are not consuming them in a few days, please freeze them.

If you don’t have a baking ring, you can use a tuna can or something similar. You also could from them by hand, but the more you play with the dough, the fewer nooks and crannies.

📖Associated Recipes

English Muffin Bread

Cheddar Bay Biscuits a la Red Lobster

Zero Fat Biscuits

Zero Fat Blueberry Scones

🔪Instructions

Warm 1 cup milk in the microwave to about 100° to 105° (about 30-40 seconds). Also, melt 1 tablespoon butter (about 10 seconds).

Combine the warmed milk, melted butter, one tablespoon sugar, and one package (2 1/4 teaspoons) quick or rapid yeast. Mix well and allow the yeast to proof for about 5 minutes until starting to foam a little. Add 2 1/2 cups of flour and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Mix well.

Cover with plastic wrap and allow it to sit overnight at room temperature.

The dough will “fall in upon itself”. Cut some 4-5 inch squares of parchment papers for later use. Preheat oven to 400° with a large nonstick jelly roll tray in the oven.

Turn the dough onto a floured surfaces, and gently roll up and then cut into 8 equal pieces. Be gentle with the dough. DO NOT KNEAD.

Place some cornmeal in a shallow bowl. Gently form the dough into balls and coat with the cornmeal.

Place a 3-inch cooking ring on a piece of the parchment paper. Drop the coated balls of dough into the ring and flatten gently to fill the ring, then “dimple” the center in about a quarter of an inch. This will help it bake flatter. Repeat for all the dough balls. Allow to rest 30 minutes for any residual rise to occur.

Remove the preheated tray from the oven. Place the muffins on the tray and dust with a little more cornmeal.

Bake for 10 minutes. Flip the muffins. Bake another 8 minutes or so until the color is nice and internal temperature of 200°.

Move to a cooling rack. Allow to cool at least 5 minutes before serving.

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📖 Recipe

Originally published May 9, 2015. Updated with expanded options, refreshed photos and a table of contents to help navigation.

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