McMake ’em yourself: breakfast sandwiches.
You know those TV ads for McDonald’s or Wendy’s or (name your favorite national chain) that show these gorgeous—I mean, FLAWLESS—fast-food hamburgers? A perfectly browned, sizzling beef patty; crisp lettuce; a thick slice of tomato; melting cheese, and a golden, light-as-air bun are gently sandwiched together, and look to be a majestic 4” tall.
That’s on the TV screen. But when you pull away from the takeout window and unwrap your hamburger, what do you see? Nothing that’s 4” tall, that’s for sure. Don’t get me wrong; I’m a sucker for McDonald’s dollar-menu double cheeseburger. But the reality of the actual burger is nothing like the carefully groomed version “as seen on TV.”
And, like their burger brethren, breakfast sandwiches go through an amazing transformation between photo studio and takeout window.
I happen to like breakfast sandwiches. Who doesn’t? Melting cheese, soft egg, a slice of savory ham, all wrapped up in a toasted English muffin. (I eschew the bagel, biscuit, and croissant versions as too high-calorie. Though with what’s between the crusts, come on, who am I kidding? This is NOT a particularly healthy breakfast.)
But that high-rise version you see in the TV ads becomes sadly flat by the time it’s assembled, wrapped, and slid into a stack of fellow sandwiches under the heat lamp. I’ve enjoyed takeout breakfast sandwiches that, I swear, were barely an inch thick.
Thus my self-challenge: you don’t like the way they look? Make your own, sister.
Which I did. Right down to the English muffins themselves.
Kind of crazy, huh, making your own English muffins? Well, not really; sometimes it’s as much about the journey as the destination, as bakers well know. (And here in the King Arthur Flour test kitchen, we take a LOT of journeys.) Pulling open a griddle-warm English muffin, seeing its craggy interior, and saying, “Wow, I made this myself”… it’s simply very satisfying.
Make truly delicious, impressive-looking breakfast sandwiches by first making these oversized English Muffins. And bookmark the recipe for Father’s Day—surely there’s a dad you know who’d appreciate a blockbuster breakfast sandwich like this one.
Combine all of the ingredients except the semolina (or farina); that’s for when you dry-fry the muffins. You can skip the semolina, but it does give them that distinctive, slightly “sandy” English muffin crust.
Mix to make a very wet dough…
Then beat at high speed for 5 minutes. Look at this beautifully glossy soft dough!
WHOA! The gluten is nicely developed, too.
Scrape the dough down to the bottom of the bowl…
…and let it rise, covered, for about 90 minutes.
Here it is, all puffed up and ready to go.
Prepare your frying tools. Semolina (or Cream of Wheat, a.k.a. farina) is easily sprinkled into English muffin rings using a tea strainer; you can also simply use your fingers. English muffin rings are key; if you don’t have them, use tuna cans (labels removed) that you’ve washed, dried, and removed both top and bottom lids. OR simply shape the muffins by hand, though they won’t be as nicely round, nor will they rise as high without the sides of the ring to contain them.
Grease the rings…
…and set them on a medium-hot (300°F) griddle. Sprinkle a shower of semolina inside each ring.
Scoop a scant 1/2 cup (2 3/4 ounces) of dough out of the bowl. It helps to wet both the measuring cup, and your fingers; this keeps the stickiness to a minimum. Stretch and shape the dough into a circle that’ll fit nicely within a ring.
Place the circle of dough in the ring. Sprinkle more semolina on top.
The dough will rise within the rings as the English muffins dry-fry.
When the muffins are golden brown on the bottom, lift off the rings and turn them over.
Lovely, huh? Cook till their bottoms are nicely browned. The whole process will take quite awhile, up to perhaps 35 minutes. The goal is to perfectly brown the muffins’ crust, while cooking them all the way through. It helps to bake a trial muffin first, to make sure your griddle is the correct temperature.
And here they are, in all their golden glory. This recipe will make about a dozen muffins.
Look at this muffin’s nicely craggy interior—perfect for a pat of soft butter. Or a breakfast sandwich fit for a king—
So let’s get to it. Use the rings to cut muffin-sized circles from slices of ham and provolone cheese (or the cheese of your choice). You certainly can skip this step, and just cut the ham and cheese in squares; but circles are nice looking.
Split muffins, and layer with ham (or cooked sausage, or fried bacon), cheese, and scrambled eggs. Place them on a parchment-lined baking sheet; the parchment will catch any melting cheese, making you thankful at cleanup time. And by the way, if you don’t use parchment to line ALL your baking sheets—why not? Did you know parchment is one of the top 10 items our customers purchase from us?
At this point, you can cover the whole shebang with plastic wrap and refrigerate till just before serving; so this is a good make-ahead brunch or breakfast treat. Can you freeze these? No. The egg and cheese will get icky. But they can live in your fridge for several days, ready to heat and serve.
If the sandwiches have been refrigerated, remove their plastic wrap. Lay a piece of parchment (darn, there it is again!) atop the muffins, then place another baking sheet on top. This flattens them very slightly, causing the meat, cheese, and egg to meld together. Bake the muffins in a preheated 350°F oven for 15 to 20 minutes.
Ah, beautiful melty cheesy hammy eggy breakfast sandwiches.
And you made them ALL yourself, from start to finish. Seems like a lot of work. Well… maybe a lot of time. But it’s not work when you love what you’re doing; because then the pleasure is in the process. And as EVERYTHING continues to climb in price, and I find myself thinking twice about any leisure time activity that involves hopping into the car and going somewhere, I remember, once again, how much I love to stay home and bake.
Read our complete recipe for Breakfast Sandwiches.
Buy vs. Bake
Buy: Takeout breakfast sandwich with egg, pasteurized process American cheese, and Canadian-style bacon, 4.8 ounces, $2.61: 54¢/ounce
Bake: Homemade breakfast sandwich with egg, provolone cheese, and deli ham, 8.5 ounces, $1.57: 18¢/ounce
May 22nd, 2008 at 1:26 pm
What a great idea! Those McMuffins look extremely scrumptious! Homemade sandwiches beat bought ones!
Cheers,
Rosa
May 22nd, 2008 at 2:02 pm
oooh…I know what tomorrow’s breakfast is! you are incredible!
May 22nd, 2008 at 4:27 pm
Oh, those look so yummy! Egg McMuffins are my favorite….I’ve always hated that McD’s stops serving breakfast at 10:30. Good thing for me that they do, though. Maybe it’s homemade from here on out.
And yes….parchment paper!!! Couldn’t live without it!
May 22nd, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Wow!~ They look wonderful. We’re making these tomorrow, too.
May 23rd, 2008 at 12:02 am
I’ve made English muffins before, and was discouraged by the process, but these look easier to make (yes, I do have rings). The muffins didn’t rise very well, but were tasty enough. And they were very tough the next day. The recipe I used didn’t mention “beat at high speed” as this one does. Maybe that’s a key point?
I’ll have to try them again.
And — where can I get some of those nifty mittens you used to handle the hot muffing rings?
Hi Ann,
The gloves are called “Ove Gloves”. We carry them in our catalogue — item 5847. We love them in the test kitchen.
Happy Baking!
MaryJane with The Baker’s Hotline @ King Arthur Flour
May 23rd, 2008 at 11:34 am
Is there a recipe using whole grains? These look great and I would love to be able to make my own but with whole grains.
Hi Lynn,
You could use white whole wheat flour in this recipe easily. We usually recommend starting with a 50/50 mix of whole wheat and AP flour for those who are not used to baking with whole grains. If you bake with whole grains more often, just substitute the white whole wheat for the AP flour, and keep in mind you may need more liquid to compensate, as whole grains absorb more liquids than lower protein white flours.
Happy Baking!
MaryJane @ The Baker’s Hotline
May 23rd, 2008 at 11:51 am
Would it work to make the dough in the bread machine? With dry milk it looks like you could use the timer and have dough ready to bake in the morning.
I am loving the store bought vs. homemade cost comparisons!
May 23rd, 2008 at 1:38 pm
Hi Sarah,
Regarding using a bread machine for the dough, it probably won’t produce the same results as the beating on high for 5 minutes. Another baker here, Mary, said she has done the dough cycle multiple times for bagel dough, so that may be something you want to experiment with. She runs the dough cycle until the first knead stops, then starts the cycle again, etc etc.
We would love to hear how this works out if you!
Happy Baking!
MaryJane with The Baker’s Hotline
May 24th, 2008 at 8:01 am
Mary Jane-
Could you use the cuisinart to beat at high speed? I have a bread machine and cuisinart but don’t have the kitchen aid.
What do you think? They look pretty yummy….
Hi Marion,
It is possible to knead the dough in the food processor. Normal batches of dough usually come together in 45-60 seconds. I don’t know exactly how long it would take in the processor to ‘equal’ the 5 minutes, but I would go 15-30 seconds at a time until the dough looked like PJ’s photo, smooth, more white than cream colored, and very elastic. Be sure to let us know how this works out!
Happy Baking!
MaryJane @ The Baker’s Hotline
May 24th, 2008 at 4:49 pm
I saw this recipe in the catalogue a while back and I’ve made it multiple times since.
I do things just a bit differently: I use baker’s grease on the rings, and skip the forming part. I use an oiled 1/3 cup measure and drop the dough straight into the rings.
These are good. Very good.
May 25th, 2008 at 1:16 pm
I made these for breakfast this weekend, and they are SOOO good! MUCH better than the fast-food kind. The muffins are also really yummy just split and toasted with just butter (and maybe a dollop of freezer strawberry jam!) I made them with 1 cup of white-whole wheat flour to 2 cups white and they turned out fine. I used a Cuisinart (no KitchenAid yet!) and it took about 3 1/2 to 4 minutes to mix. I only got 10 muffins out of the recipe though, and mine seemed about the same size as yours. I really love sourdough, any ideas of how I could incorporate sourdough starter into these? BTW, I love this blog!
Great, Joanne, glad the recipe worked for you. Maybe your rings were a tiny bit wider…? Anyway, as for sourdough, I’d say substitute some sourdough (try 2/3 of a cup?) for 1/3 cup of the flour and 1/3 cup of the milk or water. Good luck! -PJH
May 31st, 2008 at 8:26 pm
Sounds good, I haven’t made English muffins in years, maybe it is time to try again. We used to live 5 miles from a grocery and I would make bread, muffins, etc because it was much easier then trying to get to the store with 2 small children and a way to go. Now we do it to save gas!
Enjoy the blog.
June 1st, 2008 at 10:34 am
I made the recipe this morning. The best english muffins I ever had! I’ve tried other recipes but this was the best and easiest. The tip about wetting your fingers was a good one. I use a scoop to take out the dough, that worked well.
I departed from the instructions a little, since I was making two batches I wanted to speed up the production process a little.
I started the muffins on the griddle, once I flipped them I transferred them to my bakestone, in the oven pre-heated to 300 degrees.
EXCELLENT idea, finishing them by baking in the oven, Bill. I’ll have to try that sometime- PJH
June 2nd, 2008 at 1:37 pm
I have been making breakfast sandwiches for awhile for my boys to take to school on early workout mornings. Not only do they provide a wonderful make ahead breakfast( I heat them at 5:30 am the day of )but the other players drool over them. I have been known to cheat by using store bought English muffins. Your demo has me thinking this week’s project is English muffins. Thanks for making my egg snadwiches just that much better.
June 3rd, 2008 at 10:26 am
English Muffins bring back memories for me. When I was in 6th and 7th grade I lived in Nairobi, Kenya and had many American friends who missed English muffins. Me and a friend decided to make them to sell to our these friends’ mothers. We had quite a business for a couple of middle schoolers with weekly orders. All the kneading was done by hand.
As an adult I’ve only made English muffins a couple of times even though I make all my own bread–I think I’ll have to make them again in the next couple of weeks.
June 3rd, 2008 at 12:02 pm
Can you use the english muffin rings as general pastry rings/molds as well. i want to buy them to make the breakfast treats but i like to buy multitaskers because of limited space. Thanks PJ for your postings, i love them all…
Hi Jan,
You could use the muffin rings to mold other desserts, etc. They are rather shallow, maybe one inch, so layered desserts would be tricky.
Happy Baking!
MaryJane @ The Baker’s Hotline
June 5th, 2008 at 8:59 pm
I was wondering if I dont have a griddle can I use a skillet or even bake in the oven?
Kim, you can certainly bake in the skillet - a griddle is larger, which is the reason I use it. And one of our readers above said he starts by browning his English muffins in a skillet or griddle, then bakes them in the oven to finish. So you could do that, too. Good luck! - PJH
June 13th, 2008 at 9:30 am
You can use the muffin rings in a frying pan to get perfectly sized fried eggs to go in these!
Has that been suggested? I wasn’t paying attention..
I don’t see where it was specified in the post, but in the photos, it appears that the scrambled eggs were cooked in rounds. Fried eggs would work great too in the rings. Thanks!
Happy Baking!
MaryJane @ The Baker’s Hotline
Hi Pandi - I did indeed try frying the scrambled eggs in the rings, and it worked… kind of. I decided it was too much trouble to instruct people to do that. You have to pour in a very scant layer of egg first, to seal the bottom; if you pour it all in at once it leaks out like crazy. Then once the bottom is sealed, you can pour in the rest… You could indeed do a fried egg this way, and maybe it would work better, since it’s not so “loose”? Give it a try! - PJH
June 17th, 2008 at 1:48 pm
The tuna cans did not work as the bottoms are formed differently and I could not cut the bottom off. I ended using a pineapple can and 2 small coffee cans. The coffee cans worked the best because I could get my hands in to smooth out the dough in the bottom. I had to cook the muffins much longer than the recipe sugests but they are for sure a do again, maybe with more coffee cans. The muffin rings are out of stock on the web site. Bummer. Thanks for another great recipe!! My family checks now to see where the I found the recipe before they taste!
Hi Jana,
We have a replacement set of rings that we are selling until we can get more of the original vendor’s rings. You can order then by phone, as the website will not have the item number. Just call customer service at 1-800-827-6836 and they can give you a hand.
Happy Baking!
MaryJane @ The Baker’s Hotline
June 21st, 2008 at 3:23 pm
I made these with freshly ground white wheat. I added 1 T lecithin powder and 1 T gluten flour. I used a scant 1 T. SAF yeast. They came out great…nice and light.
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:46 am
Wow - awesomely good and awesomely simple. I won’t be going to Mickey D’s for breakfast anymore - I can make a week’s worth in advance and leave in the office fridge! Thanks for a brilliantly simple and tasty (and doubtless healthier than the alternative) idea. Cheers!!
Virgil - they’re cheaper, too. With gas prices being what they are, we need to think about EVERYTHING we spend money on, huh? - PJH
July 12th, 2008 at 9:41 pm
nice receipe, i’ll sure try it.
July 12th, 2008 at 9:59 pm
This is a wonderful post, even if it DID result in me spending an unplanned couple of hours in the kitchen. Really good.
Thanks, Bill - BTW, thanks again for mentioning us in your blog. Nice piece. -PJH
July 12th, 2008 at 11:02 pm
I don’t eat pork, but man…. do those look wonderful. Yum.
Egg & cheese alone is yummy, too - give ‘em a try. - PJH
July 13th, 2008 at 4:14 am
awesome…i will try to make one
August 6th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Oh, have you given me a craving.
I love your photographs, showing each step. You know that these sandwiches can be eaten, not thrown in the trash like the ones made for TV and advertisements.
August 6th, 2008 at 11:50 pm
I think this should win some sort of blog award for most tempting breakfast.
Great photos, salivating sammy!
AWESOME!
Man, Brittany - back at ya. LOVE your pie photos, they’re incredible. Lighting is gorgeous. Wish I could take pics like that! Post your URL here, would you? I think our readers, especially our pie apprecianados, would enjoy your blog. - PJH
August 11th, 2008 at 10:43 am
i’ve been staying in and baking to save money too! i baked 3 types of bread this weekend and didn’t spend a dime! now i have something to try next weekend.
August 11th, 2008 at 10:47 pm
awesome, well done, good idea, me wanty
September 8th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
Maybe that’s a stupid question, but I’m from Germany and we don’t have any English Muffins…
So, do you place the muffins in the oven or is that a griddle with internal heat source, sort of like an electric bbq-grill? I don’t have that, so could I just use a pan or put them in the oven?
Yeah, it’s a griddle with an internal heat source. And yeah - you can definitely use a pan set over a burner. It’ll just take awhile due to limited pan space, I’d guess. Do one first to fine-tune the level of heat - should be fine. PJH
September 20th, 2008 at 9:18 pm
These took a loooooong time to be done on the griddle. I ended up baking it in the oven at 300F to finish. When the interior finally reached 200F, the inside was still a little bit gummy-ish, like what sticks to a cake tester when the cake’s not done. Am I supposed to let it cool completely and then the inside will solidify more, before I eat it? Is the inside supposed to be dry like bread?
The inside should be moist, but not gummy/sticky/wet. Sounds like your griddle wasn’t quite hot enough, or the muffins were a bit too thick. They can be tricky - even though it seems like a pain, it’s often a good idea to cook a single muffin first to get the temperature down pat. And, of course, it’s fine to finish them in the oven if your griddle doesn’t cooperate… - PJH