Home › The Principles of Cookery › Tottenham Muffins
Tottenham Muffins
Beat three eggs till they are lightly frothed, and stir them into a quart of flour properly salted. Add as much lukewarm milk as will make a thick batter, and stir in a table-spoonful of clarified butter and a quarter of a pint of good fresh yeast. Cover the bowl containing the dough, and let it remain in a warm place till it is lightly risen. Drop spoonfuls of it separately on a floured board. Let these remain for a quarter of an hour, then put them into muffin hoops and bake them. When one side is slightly brown turn them upon the other. Time to rise, about an hour. Probable cost, 1/2d. each. Sufficient, one or two for each person.
A yeast-raised muffin batter of the English kind — soft, holed, cooked in rings rather than a tin. The main translation problems are the volume measures for flour and yeast, and the fact that "bake" here means a griddle, not an oven.
- "Bake" means griddleThe turning of the muffin onto its second side gives it away: these are cooked on a hot bakestone or heavy griddle over moderate heat, in greased rings, roughly 6-8 minutes a side. An oven will not produce the pale band around the middle that marks a proper muffin.
- A quart of flourFlour was measured by volume, and an imperial quart is 40 fl oz, so nearer 4¾ cups — somewhere in the region of 550-650g depending on how it was scooped. Aim for the lower figure and adjust with the milk.
- The yeastA quarter of a pint (5 fl oz / about 145 ml) of "good fresh yeast" points to a liquid yeast or brewer's barm, wetter than anything sold now and generally weaker, though its strength varied a good deal. For this quantity of flour, about 15g fresh compressed yeast (or roughly 5g instant dried) will serve, with the lost liquid made up in milk.
- Consistency"A thick batter" that can be dropped in spoonfuls yet still spread — closer to a very slack dough than a pouring batter. If the spoonfuls hold a dome without slumping at all, the batter is too stiff and the crumb will be bready rather than open.
- Clarified butterClarified butter kept better than fresh and carries none of the water or milk solids of ordinary butter. Melted unsalted butter does the same job here.
- The second restThe quarter of an hour on the floured board is a proof, not a rest. Skipping it costs you the open, holey interior; the spoonfuls should visibly puff before they go into the hoops.
- RingsMuffin hoops are plain metal bands about 3½ inches across and an inch deep. Crumpet rings, or clean tuna tins with both ends removed, work; grease them well and warm them on the griddle first.
- YieldRoughly 12-16 muffins from this quantity. The book's "one or two for each person" assumes they are being split, toasted and buttered at tea.
English muffins of this sort were a street trade before they were a home bake — the muffin man with his covered tray and bell was a fixture of London afternoons through the nineteenth century, and Cassell's gives the cost per muffin (a halfpenny), as it does a probable cost for every recipe. The Tottenham attribution is the kind of local name that attached itself loosely to a method rather than recording an inventor; Tottenham was still a semi-rural parish north of London, better known for its dairies and market gardens than its bakers. What distinguishes the muffin from its close cousin the crumpet is exactly what this recipe describes: a batter thick enough to be dropped and handled, proved twice, and turned on the griddle so both faces brown, rather than a pouring batter cooked on one side only.