Easy English Muffin Bread – No Knead, Perfect for Toasting!

This homemade English muffin bread gives you the best part of an English muffin in thick, glorious slices: crisp golden edges and all those craggy little pockets waiting for butter, jam, pecan praline honey butter, or whatever else you can justify before coffee. Toast it until the edges get crunchy and the middle stays soft, then stand back because breakfast is about to get competitive.

Table of Contents

• 🎥  Video
• 🥰 Is this English muffin bread recipe for you?
• 📋 Ingredients
• 📖 Recipe
• 🔪 How to make English muffin bread
• 🔍 What should the dough look like?
• 😱 What can go wrong (and how to fix it)
• 📚 More easy bread recipes to try
• 🎧 Listen to the recipe
• 💬 Comments

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🎥  Video

Not sure what "gloopy" dough is supposed to look like? Watch the quick video below to see the exact texture you want for those signature nooks and crannies.

Reader Review: (5 stars) Made this tonight, and I was a little nervous as I've never attempted bread before. Easy recipe to follow and turned out absolutely delicious!!! Was going to share my second loaf with a neighbor but I changed my mind after the first bite! ~Rachel

🥰 Is this English muffin bread recipe for you?

If you want homemade bread without kneading, complicated shaping, or pledging your afternoon to nurturing a lump of yeast dough, yes. Absolutely.

• No kneading required. Stir it together with a wooden spoon and call yourself accomplished.
• Made for toast. Those airy nooks and crannies get crisp around the edges while hoarding melted butter like tiny delicious dragons.
• Ready in about an hour. One short rise, a quick bake, and breakfast is handled.
• Classic English muffin texture. A wet, sticky dough and cornmeal-dusted crust give you that familiar English muffin feel in easy-to-slice loaf form.
• Freezer friendly. Slice it before freezing so you can grab exactly what you need for toast without thawing the whole loaf.

📋 Ingredients

No special bread flour required for this easy English muffin bread. The real trick is getting the temperature and texture right, so there are a couple of things worth knowing before you start.

1. Yeast - Active dry yeast works perfectly. Using instant yeast? Toss it right in with the dry ingredients and skip the proofing step. One less thing to do. We approve.
2. Water - Aim for about 110°F. Too cold and the yeast naps. Too hot and you've committed yeasticide. If you're new to bread baking, use a thermometer.
3. Sugar - Gives the yeast something to snack on while it gets busy making your bread rise. Honey works beautifully, too.
4. All-purpose flour - Plain old AP flour is exactly what you want. Put the bread flour back in the pantry. Today is not its day.
5. Milk - Use whatever kind you have, but warm it to about 110°F before adding it.
6. Butter - Salted or unsalted is fine. This is bread, not a hostage negotiation.
7. Baking soda - Helps create those glorious little craters that collect melted butter. We take this responsibility very seriously.
8. Salt - Adds flavor and keeps the yeast from getting entirely too ambitious.
9. Cornmeal - Technically optional, but traditional. It gives the outside that unmistakable English-muffin-y texture, so I use it.

🍞 Grab your Free English Muffin Kitchen Cheat Sheet for extra tips, FAQs, and more.

📖 Recipe

🔪 How to make English muffin bread

This easy English muffin bread is basically stir, scoop, rise, and bake. The dough is going to be much wetter and stickier than regular bread dough, so resist the urge to keep adding flour. Gloopy is not a baking emergency this time. It's the plan. 🍞

1. Butter the loaf pans. Get those corners, too.
2. Dust with cornmeal. English muffin business has officially begun.
3. Add sugar to the warm water. Yeast snacks incoming.
4. Stir in the yeast. Give it a little encouragement.
5. Let it get foamy. Bubbles mean everybody's alive in there.
6. Mix the dry ingredients. Easy enough.
7. Pour the yeast mixture into a large bowl.
8. Add the warm milk. About 110°F, not lava.
9. Stir in enough flour for a soft, gloopy dough. Embrace the weird.
10. Spoon into the pans and let rise. Dust the tops with cornmeal before baking.
11. Bake until golden. Try to behave while they cool.
12. Slice and admire those craters. Butter now has somewhere to live. 🧈

🔍 What should the dough look like?

Wet, sticky, and downright gloopy. If you're looking at the bowl thinking, There is no way this is bread dough, you're probably doing it right.

The dough should look like the photo below. Don't add extra flour to make it look like regular bread dough. Too much flour means fewer of those glorious nooks and crannies we're after.

😱 What can go wrong (and how to fix it)

🍞 My bread is dense with no nooks and crannies. You probably added too much flour. The dough should be wet, sticky, and gloopy, not something you could knead.

🍞 The dough isn't rising. Check the temperature of your water and milk. Around 110°F is the sweet spot. Too hot can kill the yeast, while too cool will make it sluggish. If your kitchen is chilly, here's how to make bread rise faster.

🍞 The bread is gummy in the center. Give it a few more minutes in the oven. The center should reach 190°F to 200°F on an instant-read thermometer.

🍞 My bread rose beautifully and then collapsed. It likely rose a little too long. Get it into the oven when the dough reaches the top of the pan or just above it.

🍞 The crust isn't crisp enough. Bake it toward the longer end of the range, then toast the slices before serving. English muffin bread without a little crunch is just not living up to its potential.

📚 More easy bread recipes to try

Once you've had a slice of this English muffin bread fresh from the toaster, I promise - you'll never go back to store-bought. Leave a rating, drop a comment, or tell me what you slathered on top (I'm a strawberry butter girl, but I don't judge).

🎧 Listen to the recipe

Not in the mood to read all this? Hit play below and I'll walk you through the audio version of this English muffin bread recipe with all the sass, tips, and biscuit-loving charm you've come to expect from me.