If you grew up near New Bedford, Fall River or anywhere the Azorean diaspora settled, you know these as “Portuguese muffins” — the griddled rounds sold in every New England market. In São Miguel, where they were born, they are bolos lêvedos, and they are one of the Azores’ sweetest exports.
This is the streamlined weekday version of the recipe (my full family bolos lêvedos recipe, with the long rise and the grandmother stories, is also on the site): soft, faintly sweet dough, cooked on a dry griddle until golden — no oven involved.
Split them for butter and jam, build breakfast sandwiches, or toast them like English muffins — which they outclass without visible effort.
Portuguese Muffins Recipe
Prep time: 15 minutes (plus about 2 hours rising) · Cook time: 15 minutes · Total: about 2½ hours · Servings: 4 · Calories: ~113 per serving
Ingredients
- 4 cups all-purpose flour
- ½ cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 packet (2¼ teaspoons) active dry yeast
- ¼ cup warm water (about 110°F)
- ¾ cup warm milk (about 110°F)
- 2 large eggs
- 2 tablespoons melted unsalted butter
Instructions
- Mix the yeast with the warm water and a pinch of sugar; let it foam 5 to 10 minutes.
- Combine the flour, sugar and salt. Add the yeast mixture, warm milk, eggs and melted butter, and stir into a sticky dough.
- Knead 8 to 10 minutes (or use a dough hook) until smooth.
- Rise in an oiled, covered bowl 1 to 2 hours, until doubled.
- Punch down, divide into 8 to 10 pieces, shape into balls and flatten into discs.
- Rise on a floured sheet, covered, 30 to 40 minutes more.
- Cook on a dry nonstick skillet or griddle over medium-low, 4 to 5 minutes per side, adjusting the heat so they cook through without burning.
- Serve warm or at room temperature.
Recipe Notes
- Low and slow on the griddle — they need time to cook through their fluffy middles.
- They freeze beautifully; toast straight from frozen.
- In New England they make legendary breakfast sandwiches — eggs, cheese and linguiça, obviously.
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Hi Maria,
I am looking for a portugese muffin recipe that uses malted barley flour and a hint of lemon. Loved the history of the Azorean diaspora settling in Fall River. This is where I found Tony’s Bakery, We missed the muffins this year, we are only up at Cape Cod for our yearly vacation and Tony’s Bakery was on vacation when we stopped by. It’s a 10 hour trip for us so we’ll have to wait til next year. Tryed other muffins, but Tony’s has the flavor beat. thank you for your delightful post
Donna Maria
Hi Donna,
Thank you so much for the lovely story about Tony’s and the trips to Cape Cod, that kind of loyalty says a lot about how good those muffins are.
I can’t say for certain this is Tony’s exact recipe, since bakeries like that guard their formulas closely, but based on what you described, I suspect it’s a version fairly close to this. Malted barley flour shows up in a lot of commercial New England bakery flour blends (it is what gives that slightly deeper color and flavor, and a softer crumb), and a hint of lemon zest is a common Azorean touch in bolo levedo dough. Here is my best attempt at recreating that style, adapted from my regular Portuguese muffin recipe:
Malted Barley Portuguese Muffins (Tony’s Bakery Style)
Ingredients:
– 3 3/4 cups bread flour
– 1/4 cup malted barley flour (also sold as diastatic malt powder; find it at a homebrew or baking supply shop)
– 1/2 cup sugar
– 1 teaspoon salt
– Zest of 1 lemon
– 1 packet (2 1/4 teaspoons) active dry yeast
– 1/4 cup warm water (about 110F)
– 3/4 cup warm milk (about 110F)
– 2 large eggs
– 2 tablespoons melted unsalted butter
– Fine cornmeal, for dusting
Instructions:
1. Mix the yeast with the warm water and a pinch of sugar, let it foam 5 to 10 minutes.
2. Whisk together the bread flour, malted barley flour, sugar, salt and lemon zest.
3. Add the yeast mixture, warm milk, eggs and melted butter, and stir into a sticky dough.
4. Knead 8 to 10 minutes until smooth and slightly tacky.
5. Rise in an oiled, covered bowl 1 to 2 hours, until doubled.
6. Punch down, divide into 8 to 10 pieces, shape into balls, flatten into discs, and dust both sides generously with cornmeal.
7. Rise on a floured, cornmeal-dusted sheet, covered, 30 to 40 minutes more.
8. Cook on a dry nonstick skillet or griddle over medium-low, 4 to 5 minutes per side, until deep golden and cooked through.
9. Cool slightly, then split and toast.
Notes:
– If you can’t find malted barley flour, a tablespoon of malt syrup or even a tablespoon of brown sugar swapped in for white will get you part of the way there, though the flavor will not be identical.
– The lemon should be a background note, not a citrus muffin, so go easy on the zest.
If you ever do make it up to Tony’s again and get a chance to compare, I would love to hear how close this comes. Fingers crossed for next year’s trip!