The post Buttery and Soft English Muffins appeared first on The Gluten-Free Corner.
]]>Although the English muffins are commonly found in English speaking countries such as Canada, the UK or Australia, they are not that known elsewhere. For example, I discovered this bread just a few years before I left Chile. Even today, you can’t commonly find them in the grocery stores (maybe just in some specialized ones).
A good English muffin has to be very soft and spongy inside but also needs to have a nice crust that allows the bread to be cut in half to toast it or to make a sandwich without breaking. The spongy crumb allows the bread to adhere to every speed that you use, such as jam cream cheese or some more butter to top it with something else (you won’t regret that extra butter flavour on your bread).
The crust sprinkled in cornmeal will allow us to let it rise without sticking, but also to handle it better and give it an initial browning in a hot pan.
We will be using our gum-free flour mix because we want a soft crumb, but we will add some more fibre to the dough by adding some quinoa flour (don’t worry, it won’t taste like quinoa :)). Also, we will replace the classic xanthan gum with psyllium husk for the structure to avoid the gumminess (we want them to be very tender inside).
For this recipe, we just need two baking sheets lined with parchment paper, and a frying pan large enough to “fry” the rolls before baking.
I recommend to have a scale handy so you can make every bread roll about the same size. Also, having a stand mixer makes the beating of the dough easier. Worry not, that you can also do it by hand, just make sure that you mix and homogenize everything pretty well!
Ok, so now let’s continue with the recipe!
Buttery and Soft English Muffins
Course: BreakfastCuisine: EnglishDifficulty: Medium12
servings1
hour35
minutesThese English Muffins are the perfect combination of a buttery flavour with a crunchy outside and soft inside. Perfect for toasting!
Ingredients
400 g of our gum-free flour mix
100 g quinoa flour
45 g dry skim milk powder
30 g powdered psyllium husk
9 g salt
430 g warm water (110-115ºF/40-43ºC)
10 g yeast
30 g honey
2 eggs beaten
40 g melted and cooled unsalted butter
100 g coarse cornmeal
Directions
- Mix the water, yeast and honey and let it rest for 5 minutes to activate and make sure that the yeast is alive. If you can see foam on top, it means that everything is ok!
- On the stand mixer bowl with the paddle attachment, mix and homogenize all the dry ingredients (flour mix, quinoa flour, dry skim milk powder, psyllium husk, and salt).
- Once the yeast is foaming, add the rest of the wet ingredients (butter and beaten eggs) to the dry mixture and start beating the dough up, first at a medium speed for two minutes and then raising the speed to a high speed for at least 5 minutes.
- Using a silicone spatula, remove the dough from the bowl borders and put everything together.Line up two baking sheets with parchment paper and sprinkle them with 60 g of the coarse cornmeal (30 g each baking sheet).
- Put a plate or a piece of parchment paper on your scale, and using your wet hand, take pieces of around 90-100 g of dough and shape them into balls, placing them afterwards in the cornmeal-sprinkled baking sheets. If they start sticking, just wet your hands with some more water. This recipe should yield 12 English muffins, so place 6 balls evenly distributed into each baking sheet so they have enough space to rise.
- Once ready, cover the balls with a loose plastic wrap (if you put a tight plastic wrap over the balls, it won’t allow them to rise properly). Now it’s time to proof the dough. Leave the dough on a warm and draft-free place for around 1 hour or they double in size (I use the oven, I preheat it to 120ºF/49ºC, leave the oven door open for a minute, and then I place the dough inside with the door closed and the oven light turned on).
- Take out the baking sheets from the oven and preheat it to 350ºF/180ºC.
- With a spatula, flatten the dough balls a bit to give them the classic English muffin form, and sprinkle them with the remainder cornmeal.
- Heat up a frying pan with a tbsp of oil, wiping the excess with a paper towel. Now fry each English muffin at medium heat for 1 minute each flat side. Try to press the English muffins with a spatula a bit more while frying. Be careful not to brown too much the muffins! Return the fried English muffins to the lined baking sheets once ready.
- When you finish up frying all the English muffins, remove the excess cornmeal on the baking sheets. Bake them for 30-35 minutes, flipping them over when they hit the 20 minutes mark to achieve an even browning. Check the internal temperature to be at least 195ºF/91ºC before taking them out.
- Leave them to cool for at least 20 minutes in a cooling rack and enjoy
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