What I really needed to do this past week, was make some sourdough bread. The starter was in desperate need of feeding. But I didn't have the combobules to do that, so I gave this English muffin bread a try instead. It's an interesting cross between a quick bread and a yeasted bread and rises wicked fast!

I'm not sure how much it tastes like an English muffin, but it does taste good and it's fast. You can go from mixing ingredients to taking fresh bread out of the oven in ~2 hours. Which is kind of ridiculous. Especially when I've gotten more used to measuring my bread-making times in days, rather than hours.

I think it would be interesting to try a whole wheat version of this bread at some point, but I stuck with the white flour version for now because I was already in unfamiliar territory with the mix of chemical leaveners and yeast and didn't want to change up the flour in case that messed things up.

English Muffin Bread

From Cook's Country August/September 2016

Ingredients

• 770g hard (strong/high grade/bread) flour¹
• 4 1/2 tsp. instant (rapid-rise) yeast
• 1 Tbsp. sugar
• 2 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 3 c. whole (3.25%) milk, warm (~45-50°C)

Directions

1. Combine flour, yeast, sugar, salt, and baking soda and mix well.
2. Pour in warm milk and mix to incorporate the dry ingredients.
3. Cover and let rise in warm place (25-30°C) for ~30 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, grease two loaf pans and dust them with cornmeal.
5. Stir/knock back the dough and divide it between the two loaf pans. Use a greased spatula to push the dough into the corners of the pans.
6. Cover the pans with greased plastic wrap and allow to rise in a warm place for ~30 minutes.
7. Preheat oven to 190°C (375°F).
8. Discard plastic wrap and bake loaves at 190°C (375°F) for ~30 minutes. Loaves should be well-browned and register an internal temperature of 93°C (200°F).
9. Turn bread out onto a wire rack to cool for at least 1 hour.
10. Slices should be toasted before serving.

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Variations

Whole Wheat English Muffin Bread

Ingredients

• 680-700g hard (strong/high grade/bread) whole wheat flour
• 50g gluten (vital wheat) flour
• 4 1/2 tsp. instant (rapid-rise) yeast
• 1 Tbsp. sugar
• 2 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 3 c. whole (3.25%) milk, warm (~45-50°C)

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¹ I didn't have any hard white flour, so I used 720g all-purpose flour + 50g gluten (vital wheat) flour. ^Back