English Muffins, the Easy Way!

Heart to Heart With Diane shows us an easy way to make English Muffins with the no-knead bread recipe. Super simple with pictures and step by step instructions!

by Diane Hopkins on April 25, 2011

If you think I’ve gone a bit too far on making my own no-knead bread, you are probably right! I just keep on thinking up new ways to make this amazingly easy bread dough into home-baked nutritious food for my family!

Here’s how it came about: I had bread dough in a loosely covered bowl on my counter, and no time to bake it before breakfast. Out came the pancake griddle. I put it on 350 degrees and scooped a spoonful of dough onto the griddle, being careful not to squish the bubbles out. Once it looked brown and crisp on the bottom, I flipped it over. Then I recognized what I had made: English Muffins! Yay! Fork-split, with butter and jam, these are definitely comfort food . . with whole grain nutrition!


Since that worked out so well, I decided to improve on it by turning down the heat a bit so they could bake through thoroughly, and by allowing them some rising time. (If you don’t have time to rise, they’ll still taste good—just handle them lightly so you don’t squish out any air bubbles.) Here’s my recipe:

How to Make Easy No-Knead Whole Grain English Muffins

#1 Get out a big plastic bowl with a lid, the kind you make potato salad in. It can be a glass bowl with a pan lid, if need be, but not a metal bowl.
#2 Put into the bowl:

• 7 1/2 cups whole wheat flour, hard white wheat freshly ground if possible.
• 1 1/2 tablespoons instant yeast
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 3 3/4 cup lukewarm water

Just stir to moisten all ingredients. Resist the urge to work it or knead it. Put the lid loosely on top of the bowl. Leave it on your kitchen counter. After at least 2 hours (but up to 18 hours), the bread dough is ready to form. No, you don’t knead it!
You’ll recognize this as my 100% Whole Grain Artisan Bread recipe. If you use 1/2 of the recipe, you’ll have about 12 to 16 muffins.
#3 To form English Muffins, pour approximately 1/3 cup of cornmeal onto a plate. Flour your hands and lightly scoop a golf-ball-sized ball of dough out of the bowl. Plop it gently down into the cornmeal and flip over. Pat it every so lightly into a round shape about 3/4″ thick. Lay it on the cold pancake griddle.
#4 Let the dough rise for 20 minutes (one hour and 20 minutes for refrigerated dough). Turn on pancake griddle to 300 degrees and bake for approximately 10 to 15 minutes on each side (depending on the thickness of the muffin). When the bottom of the muffins are brown and crispy, flip with a pancake turner and let bake on the other side. Cool on cooking rack.



#5 To serve, split the muffin in half lengthwise using forks to maintain the wonderful texture. Serve with butter and jam.
Whole grain fresh baked English muffins!