Down with the crumpets

Tonight has been a night of tennis, sourdough and crumpets.  Let me tell you about the crumpets!

225g strong white flour
225g plain flour
3/4 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 tbsp dried instant yeast
500ml lukewarm water
1tsp salt
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
150ml lukewarm milk

Mix flour, cream of tatar and yeast in a bowl.  Add the water, mix up with your fingers and beat for a couple of minutes (I just used my hand) until it's relatively smooth.  Cover and it ignore it for an hour while you go and play some tennis.  Apparently the batter rises, then falls again, but because I was out I didn't see it happen.

When you get back, sprinkle the teaspoon of salt over the mix and stir it in, giving the mix another good beat for around a minute.  Then, ignore it for another 20 minutes while you take a shower.

Whack a heavy frying pan onto the heat - I used a hob temperature of 6 out of 9 - and wait for it to heat up.  Meanwhile grease your crumpet rings.  Stir the bicarb into the milk, then add this to the batter and stir it in.  The batter is now ready for griddling!

Plonk a greased crumpet ring into your pan, and half-fill the ring with batter.  This is the "test crumpet".  If the batter oozes out under the ring, then it's too thin - stir some flour in.  If you don't get bubbles/holes forming as it cooks, then it's too thick - add a bit of milk.  It should look something like this...

As soon as the batter in the ring has set, slide the ring off and dunk it in a bowl of cold water - this makes it cool enough to grease up for your next crumpet.  Flip the crumpet over and briefly griddle the top so that it goes speckly brown.  The underneath should be a nice consistent golden brown colour.  If it's burnt, turn your hob down a touch because the bottom's burning before it can cook through.

Once it's suitably browned, take it out of the pan and let it cool on a rack... or just slap some butter on it and eat it - your choice!

This recipe made 14 good crumpets, plus 5 which I messed up.  Depending on how generous you are when spooning the batter into the pan, you should get between 10 and 20 crumpets.  Remember to keep your crumpet rings well greased!  Freeze any crumpets you're not going to eat straight away, otherwise they'll probably go a bit funky after a couple of days.

TTFN,

Bob