One of former First Lady Lucy Hayes favorite recipes to make was homemade Crumpets. While doing some research, I came across her personal recipe from The Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Library and Museum:

And here’s the modern recipe that I used today:

Homemade Crumpets

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups whole milk

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons granulated sugar

1 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast

11/2 cups lukewarm water

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

Oil for the pan, cooking spray or melted butter

Directions

Warm the milk in a saucepan. Make sure that it is warm but not boiling. Otherwise, it will kill the yeast.

In a large bowl, add the warm milk, flour, sugar, and yeast in a large bowl and whisk together until all incorporated.

Once combined, add half (3/4 cup) of the water and beat into the batter.

Continue to add more water (3/4 cup) until the batter is thick and smooth. Add more water if needed. Stop adding water once it reaches the consistency of thick cream.

Cover with plastic wrap and leave in a warm, draft-free place until the dough is doubled in size. This should take about 1 hour but can take up to 2 hours.

Once the dough has doubled in size, add in the salt and baking powder into the batter and whisk together.

Heat a large heavy-duty non-stick skillet over medium to medium-high heat until hot.

Moisten a paper towel with a little oil and grease the base of the pan and crumpet (or pastry) rings – use rings that are approximately 3 inches wide by 1/2 inch tall.

Place 1 ring on the heated pan and pour in enough batter to fill just below the top of the ring – about 1/4 cup of batter or a little more if needed.

Cook for at least 5 minutes until there are many tiny holes on the surface and the crumpet is setting around the edges.

Flip the crumpet over (in the ring) and cook until the crumpet is light brown and cooked through, about 3-4 minutes more.

Repeat with the remaining batter, greasing the pan and rings in between each batch.

Remove the crumpets and place on a wire rack until cooled completely.

Toast a crumpet and add butter and jam if desired.