Bagels.
Aren't they delish? I mean, think about it, how yummy is that circled piece of dough? I grew up in a family where every Saturday my dad went and bought fresh bagels from the local bagel shop. Yummy! I'm the type of person who will eat the same thing for months on end, and then randomly get tired of it and switch to something else. I remember in middle and high school going through an egg bagel phase, an onion bagel phase, a cinnamon and sugar bagel phase, and a plain bagel phase. I'm not a huge cream cheese fan (though I do love me some cheesecake), so I usually ate my bagels warmed with butter. I guess to me, bagels are comfort food.
Until today, I had never attempted to make a bagel before. I mean, there's Panera, Brueggers, Einstein Bros., Lenders frozen bagels. SO many bagel selections, it seems kind of dumb to waste your time and energy making them from scratch. But what I love about baking is the adventure of trying to learn something new, the good, the bad, the absolutely awful (like my macaroons). There's a challenge to learning new things, and these are the kind of challenges I like.
First I needed to learn how to bake a bagel. Ha, that sounds funny, but it's true. I mean, I can make bread dough as well as the next budding baker, but there had to be some secret to the successful bagel, something different that takes the dough from being just another loaf to the magical roundness of the bagel. I found the secret, but I'll get to that in a minute.
So, let me be honest about a very important part of my personality: sometimes I don't think things through all the way. I think "Hey, __________ would be an amazing thing to do/say/buy/build/bake" and forget about that one big problem that accompanies that statement. Today, that one big problem happened to be time. Why do we buy prepackaged bread at Giant Eagle? Because it takes flipping forever to make bread!! Bread baking is not an after work kind of activity. Especially when it requires the additional steps that bagel making does.
Still, I plowed on. I mixed, I kneaded, I let it rise (that's what's so time consuming about bread!!). I kneaded some more, and some more, and some more. Punched a lot of frustrations out into this poor loaf. The past few weeks all sort of built up into one glorious pounding, and it felt wonderful. If you happen to eat one of these bagels, know that I baked some pent up frustrations into each and every delicious bite. :-)
Once the dough was ready, it was time to form bagels. Easier said than done, and I definitely need some work. But then it came to the best part, the secret moment where this dough goes from being just another loaf of bread to the yummy goodness of bagel perfection: boiling.
If you can imagine, I had to boil a large pot of water, and then drop the raw dough into the water for about 5 minutes. If you're confused, don't worry, so was I, but every website I read (including Wikipedia, and we all know we can absolutely trust Wikipedia!) said that boiling the dough before baking it gives bagels that crunchy outside shell and the soft middle we all love about bagels. Well...this is a learning experience, so I'm all in! Into the boiling pot they went.
Afterwards, they took a quick bath in an egg wash, half were sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, and into the oven they went. You should smell my Mexican crack den right now, it smells delicious, all cinnamon-y and yeast-y and bagel-y. Mmmmmmmmmm :-) Shame you're not here.
For my first bagel making experience, I was surprised at how well they turned out. The recipe is easy if you have the patience to devote to the process...from start to finish it probably took me 2 1/2 hours to make 8 bagels...we're not setting any land records there, but, again, it was a learning process. Maybe someday I too can earn the title of speed bagel baker.
Well, it's off to finish up some fundraising paperwork for the fundraiser we're kicking off here on Thursday, and then it's off to bed for this girl. I have the most amazing breakfast in the world waiting for me tomorrow, though: fresh, homemade bagels!!!
Lis
Aren't they delish? I mean, think about it, how yummy is that circled piece of dough? I grew up in a family where every Saturday my dad went and bought fresh bagels from the local bagel shop. Yummy! I'm the type of person who will eat the same thing for months on end, and then randomly get tired of it and switch to something else. I remember in middle and high school going through an egg bagel phase, an onion bagel phase, a cinnamon and sugar bagel phase, and a plain bagel phase. I'm not a huge cream cheese fan (though I do love me some cheesecake), so I usually ate my bagels warmed with butter. I guess to me, bagels are comfort food.
Until today, I had never attempted to make a bagel before. I mean, there's Panera, Brueggers, Einstein Bros., Lenders frozen bagels. SO many bagel selections, it seems kind of dumb to waste your time and energy making them from scratch. But what I love about baking is the adventure of trying to learn something new, the good, the bad, the absolutely awful (like my macaroons). There's a challenge to learning new things, and these are the kind of challenges I like.
First I needed to learn how to bake a bagel. Ha, that sounds funny, but it's true. I mean, I can make bread dough as well as the next budding baker, but there had to be some secret to the successful bagel, something different that takes the dough from being just another loaf to the magical roundness of the bagel. I found the secret, but I'll get to that in a minute.
So, let me be honest about a very important part of my personality: sometimes I don't think things through all the way. I think "Hey, __________ would be an amazing thing to do/say/buy/build/bake" and forget about that one big problem that accompanies that statement. Today, that one big problem happened to be time. Why do we buy prepackaged bread at Giant Eagle? Because it takes flipping forever to make bread!! Bread baking is not an after work kind of activity. Especially when it requires the additional steps that bagel making does.
Still, I plowed on. I mixed, I kneaded, I let it rise (that's what's so time consuming about bread!!). I kneaded some more, and some more, and some more. Punched a lot of frustrations out into this poor loaf. The past few weeks all sort of built up into one glorious pounding, and it felt wonderful. If you happen to eat one of these bagels, know that I baked some pent up frustrations into each and every delicious bite. :-)
Once the dough was ready, it was time to form bagels. Easier said than done, and I definitely need some work. But then it came to the best part, the secret moment where this dough goes from being just another loaf of bread to the yummy goodness of bagel perfection: boiling.
If you can imagine, I had to boil a large pot of water, and then drop the raw dough into the water for about 5 minutes. If you're confused, don't worry, so was I, but every website I read (including Wikipedia, and we all know we can absolutely trust Wikipedia!) said that boiling the dough before baking it gives bagels that crunchy outside shell and the soft middle we all love about bagels. Well...this is a learning experience, so I'm all in! Into the boiling pot they went.
Afterwards, they took a quick bath in an egg wash, half were sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, and into the oven they went. You should smell my Mexican crack den right now, it smells delicious, all cinnamon-y and yeast-y and bagel-y. Mmmmmmmmmm :-) Shame you're not here.
For my first bagel making experience, I was surprised at how well they turned out. The recipe is easy if you have the patience to devote to the process...from start to finish it probably took me 2 1/2 hours to make 8 bagels...we're not setting any land records there, but, again, it was a learning process. Maybe someday I too can earn the title of speed bagel baker.
Well, it's off to finish up some fundraising paperwork for the fundraiser we're kicking off here on Thursday, and then it's off to bed for this girl. I have the most amazing breakfast in the world waiting for me tomorrow, though: fresh, homemade bagels!!!
Lis
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