Welcome…and bagels!

Welcome!

So, it’s officially 2010 and I decided to start a blog. Kind of nerdy, I know, but I figured it would be a good way to keep in touch with friends and family, and ALSO to document my cooking adventures.

Why Life with B’s? Well, right now most of my time is occupied by my fiancé Brett and our beagle Izzy. If you ask anyone who knows me well what I like, they will most likely tell you bulldogs and burgers. Also, over the past year I’ve made it a goal to learn how to bake bread (with some pretty epic failures), and Brett and I have started brewing our own beer. So… all things that begin with B. Again, kinda nerdy, but it works for me.

So for this first post, and in the spirit of things that begin with b, I give you bagels!

I got the recipe from a food blog that I really enjoy, Sugarlaws. They weren’t fantastic, but I had a lot of fun making them and will probably try some other recipe for bagels again in the future.

Whole Wheat Bagels

adapted from Sugarlaws

INGREDIENTS:
2 cups white whole wheat flour
1 cup bread flour
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1 package active dry yeast
3/4 cup warm water

DIRECTIONS:
First you need to proof the yeast. I used a 1/2 cup of warm water, 1 tablespoon of sugar, and 1 package of yeast. The water needs to be warm in order to activate the yeast, but if it’s too hot to touch it will kill the yeast. Mix everything together and let it sit for five minutes.

See the bubbles? That means it worked and the yeast is activated. Yay!

Mix the yeast mixture, the rest of the water, salt, sugar, and both flours, and knead for about 5-10 minutes. My dough was really dry, so I had to add about another 1/2 cup of water at this step.

Allow the to rise in a greased bowl, covered with saran wrap, for about an hour. I’ve learned that dough needs to rise in a warm place. A co-worker told me to turn on my oven for a minute, just so it’s slightly warm, and put the bowl in there to rise. That seems to work well.

After it has about doubled in size, punch the dough down, and let it rest on a lightly floured surface.

Meanwhile,  bring a pot of water to a boil. Stir in 3 tablespoons of sugar.

Cut dough into 9 equal pieces, and roll each piece into a small ball.

So, my dough didn’t rise very much and I ended up with 9 very small pieces.  I was hoping the bagels would expand in size while baking, but that didn’t end up happening.

Poke a hole in the middle of each ball, and pull the dough gently to enlarge the hole.

You will see I only have 7 bagels. I was kind of worried about the smallness, so I combined 4 balls to make 2 larger bagels.

Next, prepare a baking sheet with parchment or silipat and preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Carefully transfer bagels to boiling water, and boil for 1 minute, turning halfway through.

Drain briefly after taking each bagel out of the water, and place it on the baking sheet. Sprinkle them with your choice of toppings (sea salt, poppy seeds, sesame seeds, etc). I used a combination of sesame seeds, sea salt, and dried onion.

Bake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes, or until lightly browned.

Here’s the finished product! It looks exactly like the pre-baked bagel! Overall, the bagels were pretty good. Our apartment smelled like freshly baked bread, and they were warm – you can’t really go wrong with that. Brett gave them a thumbs up, and Izzy definitely enjoyed the half-bagel she got to eat.

That’s all for now! Here’s one last photo of Izzy, and how she occupied her time when I made bagels.