from Kris B.

This is diet week here…only one recipe.  🙂

Tracey has been really sick this week and is feeling pretty lousy so she is not cooking or eating or doing much of anything right now so I am going solo today so she has time to rest and recuperate..  Hopefully she will feel well enough to share her intended recipe for today in her Monday in Michigan post next week.  Please send her some happy, healing thoughts!

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I am a fan of anything bread.  That includes the crumpet, which is probably not a household word in most U.S homes.  So what exactly is a crumpet?  The best description I have is that it is something between an English muffin and an unsweetened pancake.  English muffins and crumpets both have a texture that is full of nooks and crannies, making them perfect vehicles from butter and jam, but with the English muffins these “holes” are visible only on the inside once the muffin has been split in half.  Because crumpets are only cooked on one side, their “bubbles” tend to rise to the surface and are visible on the outside of the uncooked side. Both English muffins and crumpets are cooked in rings, making them a unifrom round size, about that of an American biscuit.  Crumpets are thinner than English muffins, more like thick pancakes,  and do not require splitting to eat.  Crumpets also have a slightly spongier texture than do English muffins, making them a nice contrast to their more familiar breakfast bread counterpart.

Now that I’ve sung the praises of crumpets in general, I’ll share my experience with the King Arthur Flour recipe.  I had never made crumpets before so I followed the King Arthur recipe blindly.  I mixed all of the ingredients called for – flour, milk, water, butter, yeast, baking powder, and salt – and then beat them vigorously for two minutes as the recipe directed. The batter then rested for an hour.

The crumpets are cooked in rings on a griddle.  The instructions call for 1/4 cup of batter to be dropped into each ring.  My batter was extremely “elasticy,” and was more like dough than batter. When dropped on the hot griddle, it did not spread to fill the rings.  It also did not form the characteristic crumpet holes on the topas it cooked.  When all was said and done, the King Arthur Flour Crumpet recipe produced something much more like an English muffin than a crumpet.  They are flavorful and will be eaten, but disappointing in that I wanted a traditional crumpet.

I couldn’t let the fact that I had been defeated by this recipe go.  I wanted to know whether my lack of success was baker’s error or recipe error.  My first step on this quest was to read the recipe reviews onn the King Arthur website.  I almost never read reviews before I make a recipe because I want to form my own opinions based on my own experience.  As I read this recipe’s reviews, several people, many of them British, said that this recipe did not produce a traditional crumpet, though most agreed that the taste was quite acceptable.

I then researched crumpet recipes from other sources.  I was fairly certain that because my batter was more like dough that the King Arthur ratio of flour to liquid was off.  Also, none of the recipes that I encountered called for baking powder; all used soda.  After reading all of these other recipes, I am fairly certain that the use of baking powder rather than baking soda is a typo in the King Arthur recipe.  Baking soda is a hallmark ingredient of crumpets; I can’t believe that King Arthur would have intentionally written their recipe to use baking powder.

Also, the batter’s long rest time, an hour, most certainly added to it’s elasticity.

Though I readlly didn’t have time, I decided to make another batch of crumpets modifying the recipe slightly to see if I could alter my results.

• I reduced the amount of flour from 3 1/2 cups to only 3 cups
• I used baking soda instead of baking powder
• I reduced the batter’s resting time from an hour to 30 minutes

These three things made a world of difference!!!  This batch was exactly right in appearance and texture.  The batter spread to fill the rings and those characteristic bubble holes rose to the top as the crumpet cooked.  These are very simple adjustments to the recipe yet they make a huge difference.

My crumpet experience ended on a happy note!

If you are looking for a change from your morning toat or English muffin, give this easy to make recipe, with the adjustments :-), a try.  Topped with some butter and your favorite jam r jelly, these crumpets are sure to be a hit.

The recipe for King Arthur Flour’s Crumpets.