“Dough! Are you making dough? I can have some dough?”

The clank of the mixer bowl snapping onto mixer sends The Little running to the kitchen from anywhere inside our fence line. She has always had super Spidey hearing. When she was a newborn, the sound of milk pouring over my cereal downstairs in the kitchen would be enough to wake her from a nap upstairs. Every single time.

Unless we’re talking about cracking eggs or making pizza/bread dough, she’s not overly interested in helping in the kitchen. And this is what it usually looks like when I ask “Do you want to help Mommy measure the flour/cut cookies/do anything else besides eat raw bread dough or crack a couple of eggs?”

Lately, she’d rather paint or draw. Or wear a princess fairy dress.

It’s like we’re barely related some days 🙂

But the promise of a pinch or two of bread dough can cut a tantrum short and get my scattered toy mess of a living room picked up in no time. So we’re making a lot of bread lately.

English muffins are one of those bread things that are plenty easy enough to drop into your cart at the store but are so much more delicious when made at home, you just need to find a couple of hours on a weekend to let the dough rise and then some hands-on shaping and cooking time.

Just be warned – after eating Eggs Benedict or a breakfast sandwich on homemade English muffins, the store-bought variety will never even come close to living up to them. Even when drowned in all that magical Hollandaise sauce.

Need help deciding what to do with all those English muffins? We clearly vote for Eggs Benedict:

Or this beauty that’s coming soon to a blog near you:

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Homemade English Muffins

English muffins couldn't be easier to make and taste so much better than their store-bought counterpart.

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cups lukewarm milk
• 2 1/4 tsp (1 pkg) yeast
• 3 Tbsp butter, softened
• 1 1/4 tsp salt
• 2 Tbsp sugar
• 1 large egg
• 4 1/2 cups flour
• Oil for bowl and hands
• Cornmeal for pans

Instructions

1. Place milk in the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and sprinkle yeast over top.
2. Let sit for 10 minutes and then add the butter, salt, sugar, egg, and flour.
3. Mix on low until the flour is incorporated and then switch to medium and beat for 5 minutes - dough will be very soft and sticky.
4. Scrape dough out into an oiled bowl and cover, letting rise for ~2 hours.
5. Keeping your hands well oiled to prevent the dough from sticking, pinch golf ball sized pieces of dough off (2 oz, if you have a kitchen scale), form a ball, and place on a griddle pan that is generously dusted with cornmeal.
6. Lightly press down on the balls once on the pan (I could fit 8-10 on my griddle and then I put the remainder on a baking sheet to cook in two batches).
7. Let rest for 20 minutes.
8. Turn burner or grill to medium low and cook until golden brown, ~12 minutes on each side. (If they brown too quickly, reduce the heat.)
9. Carefully transfer the second batch to the griddle so as not to deflate them and cook until done.
10. Let cool completely on a rack before splitting open with a fork.
11. Muffins will keep fresh on the counter a few days and freeze well.

Notes

Yields: 16 muffins

Slightly adapted from King Arthur Flour

Estimated time: 3 hours