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English Muffins

A yeast-based batter of eggs, butter, sugar, milk, and flour, baked into muffins.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

English Muffins

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the batter

  1. Beat the eggs until very light.

  2. Add salt, softened butter, sugar, warm milk, and dissolved yeast.

  3. Stir in enough flour to make a stiff batter and beat thoroughly.

  4. Let the batter stand overnight in a cool place.

Rise and bake

  1. In the morning, beat the batter thoroughly again.

  2. Turn the batter into well-buttered muffin pans and let rise slowly for 1 hour.

  3. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 20 minutes.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Add structure and richness, and help the batter hold its shape while it rises.
Yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, which makes the muffins rise and gives them an open, airy crumb.
Flour
Forms the gluten network that traps gas and gives the muffins their body.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and flavour, and softens the crumb.
Milk
Adds moisture and some sugars that help the crust brown.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and some browning.

The step that matters

Overnight standing of the batter. The batter must be left in a cool place long enough for the yeast to ferment slowly. Too warm or too short a rest gives weak flavour and poor rise, while the long cool rest builds flavour and a light texture.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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