Skip to main content
Breakfast

English Muffins

A yeasted bread product made with milk, water, sugar, lard or butter, flour, and salt, baked on a griddle.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and butter 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

Make the dough

  1. Dissolve the yeast and sugar in lukewarm water.

  2. Add the melted lard or butter and 3 cups of flour, then beat until smooth.

  3. Add the remaining flour, or enough to make a soft dough, and then add the salt.

  4. Knead the dough until smooth and elastic.

  5. Place the dough in a well-greased bowl, cover, and let it rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about 2 hours.

Shape and cook

  1. Form the dough into 12 large, round biscuits and cover them.

  2. Let them rest for about 30 minutes.

  3. Roll each biscuit to about ¼ inch thick, keeping them round.

  4. Preheat an ungreased griddle and bake the muffins for 10 minutes, browning both sides.

  5. Move the muffins to a cooler part of the stove to bake more slowly, keeping them warm in the oven until all are baked.

Serve

  1. Serve hot with plenty of butter.

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. Milk + buttertop 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. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Flour
Forms the gluten network that gives the muffins structure and chew.
Yeast
Produces gas as it ferments, making the dough rise and become light.
Lard or butter
Adds fat that tenderizes the crumb and softens the texture.
Milk
Adds milk proteins and sugars that contribute softness and browning.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast and adds sweetness and browning to the crust.

The step that matters

Move the muffins to a cooler part of the stove to bake more slowly. Cooking too hot browns the outside before the inside sets, leaving the centre doughy. Slower heat lets the interior cook through while the surface stays golden.

“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.

You might also like

Rice GruelRice Gruel28 recipesPeptoned Milk GruelPeptoned Milk Gruel9 recipes