Can you freeze English muffins if you can’t eat them right away? Yes, but the way you store them will affect how they taste after you reheat them.
How To Freeze English Muffins
Here’s how to do that:
The first step is pre-slicing the English muffins. Use a fork for this instead of a knife. Pulling them apart with a fork helps retain their internal structure, where the air bubbles are good for cupping honey, jam, or other fillings. This works similarly to waffles. Separating English muffins this way makes it easier to reheat them later and will not lower their quality.
Next, wrap each set of halves separately. Many people use aluminum foil for bread, but you can also use plastic wrap or similar storage material. The goal here is to minimize the air that flows over the product, which will ultimately lead to damage and freezer burn.
Pick a Proper Container
After that, find a proper freezer bag. If you bought the muffins from a store, the plastic wrapping them is usually too thin to work correctly in a freezer. It’s better to use a resealable plastic bag designed for freezers because it’s thicker and much less likely to get damaged over time.
If you’re using a bag, squeeze out as much air as you can before sealing the bag. This will reduce the amount of freezer burn your food experiences.
Alternatively, you can store your English muffins in a large, sealed container. Some people use a large plastic container to rotate bread through as needed, which provides even more protection. However, it also wastes some space in the freezer, so it’s not a good choice for every family.
Finally, decide where you want to store your muffins. The best place is in the coldest part of the freezer, which is always somewhere in the back and usually lower in the freezer. The temperature is closest to constant there, which helps prevent freezer burn. Things near the front are more likely to experience changes.
You can put your English muffins closer to the front if you’re using a thick plastic container. These containers don’t change their temperature quickly enough when you open the door to hurt your food, so they provide added flexibility in storing food while maintaining quality.
Finally, regardless of where you store your English muffins, try to keep them away from anything with a strong odor. They might adopt those smells as part of their flavor, which can ruin the experience of eating them.
How Long Do English Muffins Last In The Freezer?
Can you freeze English muffins any longer than three months, you ask? Yes, you can.
While you should eat them within three months for the best quality, they’ll last for up to six months if you need to keep them any longer. Past this point, they’re likely to start suffering damage even if you stored them well.
Everything eventually dehydrates and experiences freezer burn, so make sure you have a plan to use the muffins and try to eat the oldest ones first.
What Is The Best Way To Store English Muffins?
Storing them this way means you don’t have to half-defrost them to separate them later, which makes them considerably easier to use.
For more information on storing English muffins and other types of food, make sure you familiarize yourself with the USDA guidelines.
How To Thaw English Muffins
For faster results, start by heating them for 20-30 seconds in your microwave. The time you’ll need depends on the power of your microwave, so experiment a little and figure out what works best for you.
Optionally, you can put a paper towel around the muffins while you’re microwaving them. This will help keep their remaining moisture in and stop them from drying out too much while you’re reheating them.
You don’t need to completely thaw them here. In fact, it’s okay even if part of the muffin still feels cold and frozen. The goal of using a microwave this way is softening the muffins up a little and turning them from frozen solid to a more room-temperature setting.
Once they’re partially thawed this way, you can put them in a toaster or toaster oven and finish heating them. They should end up near their normal toasting temperature and taste just fine. Bread is one of the more durable products you can put in the freezer, so you may not even notice the difference as long as you eat them within a few months of freezing.
Advanced Toasting
This is a great opportunity to add wetter toppings like pesto, meats, cheeses, or anything else you want to add that can be warmed up. However, the density of your toppings makes a large difference here. If you pile things on too thickly, the heat won’t get all the way to the muffin and some parts will still be cold.
To mitigate this, try to avoid having the toppings be any thicker than the muffin itself. Similarly, experiment a little with your specific toppings and with different settings on your toaster oven to see what heats the best.
In many cases, toasting a little above the halfway point works out well for English muffins. While that might be too much for them normally, the extra ingredients will absorb most of the heat and help provide a consistent temperature for the final result.
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