Bagel Attempt

One of the foods I've been consistently able to eat and enjoy this pregnancy is bagels, and no one in this house ever eats alone, with Jane in the vicinity to say "MAMAcanIhaveaBITE?"


So we have been racking up quite the bagel grocery bill. I have long resisted Chase's desire for homemade tortillas, even though we eat a lot of those too, because tortillas are ridiculously cheap to buy. But bagels, now that we no longer live near a Trader Joes (sob) are not. And there's a pretty simple recipe in my beloved Artisan Bread book, so I decided to give them a try.


Here's my capricious kitchen helper. About 3 seconds after this picture, she ate a fistful of salt from the salt cellar, and tried to wash it down with raw bagel dough. Then she went to her room for a little enforced rest time. This is the difficult time for kitchen helpers, in between being content to pour beans back and forth in tupperware containers on the floor, and being able to break eggs and stir on their own, like someone's big sister gets to do. It's a complicated balance, to keep her feeling involved and helpful, without letting her do injury to herself or ruin whatever we're making. Not starting a project 30 minutes before naptime would probably also be a good idea...

The dough was really easy to work with, since it was just pulled from the batch of plain boule dough I already had chilling in the fridge. And only a minimal amount of it got stuck in my jewelry, which I NEVER remember to take off until halfway through any bread making endeavor.


And here's the part that had intimidated me in the past and kept me from trying homemade bagels. I wasn't too sure how the boiling pot part would work, but it was actually very simple and fast. Then it was back onto the floured peel, and into the over on the hot stone for another 20 minutes. The girls requested an extra step, so we sprinkled them with cinnamon and sugar first.


I only made a small batch for this first attempt, but it was such a fast hassle free project that I will definitely be making these again and freezing as many as will fit in the freezer.


So far none have made it into the freezer. None have actually made it into the pantry either. We are trying to save some until Chase gets home, but I doubt we'll have any left for breakfast tomorrow. Maybe I should make some cookies, just so the bagels stand a chance...