Wild Yeast Water English Muffins Two Ways

I have been meaning to make some English Muffins for a while now and wanted to try to use my fairly new Wild Yeast Water Starter as the levain instead of yeast.  I tried a recipe I found on The Fresh Loaf last week and unfortunatley it resulted in hockey pucks.  I decided to try a sourdough English Muffin recipe I found on The Fresh Loaf and convert it to using WYW as the starter.  Since I decided to make some extra starter with the WYW I figured I might as well try changing it up a bit and used some Durum flour instead of AP flour and also use some greek yogurt instead of milk as well as some cheese.

I have to say the Durum version with the yogurt turned out much better than the plain milk version with AP flour.  It had a much better rise when baking and turned out more tender and flavorful than the AP version.

All in all, I was very happy with the final result and would definitely make these again, but would use yogurt instead of milk.

Wild Yeast Starter Build 1

75 grams European Style Flour from KAF or AP Flour

75 grams Wild Yeast Water

Mix the flour and starter and let sit covered on your counter for 4 hours and proceed to step 2 or put in the refrigerator until ready to proceed to Build 2.

Wild Yeast Starter Build 2

65 grams European Style Flour or AP Flour

65 grams Wild Yeast Water

Mix in above ingredients with Starter from Build 1 and let sit out at room temperature in covered bowl for 4 - 6 hours.  Either use immediately after 4-6 hours or put in refrigerator and use the next day.

Version 1 English Muffins Main Dough

111 grams Starter from above

240 grams Milk

342 grams European Style or AP Flour

13 grams Sugar

5 grams Salt

6 grams Baking Soda

Semolina or Cornmeal for Dusting

Directions

Mix flour, starter and milk in your mixing bowl and mix for 1-2 minutes to combine.

Cover the bowl and let it sit out at room temperature overnight.

The next morning add the rest of the ingredients and mix for a minute.  Knead the dough either with your mixer or by hand for around 4 minutes, adding additional flour if necessary.  Next roll out the dough to about 3/4" thickness on your work surface.  You will have to put some bench flour on the work surface to prevent the dough from sticking.  Using  4" biscuit cutter or can, cut the muffins out and place on a pan lined with parchment paper dusted with corn meal or semolina flour.  You should end up with 5-6 muffins.  If necessary you can combine the scraps and roll out again but you may need to let it rest before rolling.

Cover the muffins with a clean misted or floured towel and let rest for 1 hour at room temperature.

Heat your griddle or heavy skillet to medium or around 350 degrees  and when ready to cook spray some cooking spray on the cooking surface before placing the English Muffins in the pan.

Cover the pan to create some steam and let cook for around 5 minutes or until the bottoms are nice and brown.  Flip and cook another 5 minutes and remove to a baking rack to cool.

Version 2 Semolina English Muffins Main Dough

Ingredients

97 grams Starter from above

310 grams Durum Flour

150 grams Greek Plain Yogurt

100 grams Water (85-90 degrees F.)

6 grams Baking Soda

13 grams Sugar

5 grams Salt

26 grams Cheese (I used a mix of Parmesan, Asiago and Fontina)

Follow same directions as in Version 1 but add the cheese on baking day.

Both versions taste great with some butter, jam or cheese.

Enjoy.

This bread has been submitted to Yeast Spotting here at http://www.wildyeastblog.com/

Version 1 Crumb

Version 2 Durum Crumb

Succulents

Oriental Lilies

Cone Flower