Home Made English Muffins
An Original Recipe by Not Quite Nigella
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1 3/4 cup milk
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1 tablespoon sugar
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2 teaspoons instant dried yeast
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45 g butter, melted
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4 1/4 cups bread flour
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1 1/2 teaspoons salt
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1 teaspoon baking powder
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1 egg
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1/4 cup cornmeal
Step 1 - Heat milk and sugar until lukewarm and the sprinkle over with the yeast. Cover with cling film and allow to become frothy-about 10 minutes.
Step 2 - Place the butter, flour, salt, baking powder, egg and yeast mixture in a bowl and knead by hand for about 8 minutes or with a dough hook (5-6 minutes) until the dough becomes elastic. Place back in the bowl (make sure that it's clean) and cover with cling film and allow to rise in a warm draught-free place for about 1 hour-it has lots of yeast and baking powder so it should rise to double or triple its original size.
Step 3 - Place the cornmeal in a shallow bowl and line a large baking tray with parchment or foil. Punch down dough and knead lightly and shape into a round. Place on a floured surface and roll out to one inch thick. Cut out circles using a flour dipped cookie cutter or even an clean empty tin-mine were 8.5cms/3.4inches in diameter. Dust tops and bottoms with the cornmeal and set aside on the lined tray.
Step 4 - Preheat oven to 160C/325F. Also heat a frypan on low heat (about 3 out of 10 with 10 being the hottest) and without adding any oil, cook the dough rounds making sure to brush away any excess cornmeal. Cook them for about 3 minutes on each side and make sure to put the lid on while they are cooking. Place the now browned muffins back on the lined tray.
Step 5 - Then to make sure that they're completely cooked inside, bake the now browned muffins for 15-20 minutes. You can do this completely on the stovetop skipping the oven step but it's more time consuming if you have a small pan as you need to cook them for about 7-8 minutes on each side and doing it in the oven is speedier unless you have a big grill. Once baked, cool for 5-10 minutes and then split with a fork-you do this by sticking the tines of a fork into the centre and pulling the two halves apart gently, they will make their own divide down the centre.