Homemade Bagels

This post was a long time coming. I was vacillating between psyching myself up to making bagels and then I was convincing myself that they were just too hard to do. Finally, my son, the Musician, was rumaging through the cupboards, frige, freezer as teenagers are want to do and he said,"Boy, I wish we had some bagels to go with that cream cheese." Suddenly, I was in the kitchen saying that I'd make some.

I originally intended to make bagels following Smitten Kitchen's recipe, but instead I grabbed my trusty Joy of Cooking and followed that recipe. It took about an hour (less time than bread!) and the results were out of this world. All the family said I needed to keep on making homemade bagels from now on.

Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups water
2 tsp yeast
1 Tbls sugar
2 tsp salt
1 Tbls oil
3 to 3 1/2 cups flour Combine the water, yeast, sugar, oil and salt in the mixer. After a sponge has formed, add the 3 - 3 1/2 cups flour. The recipe says the dough will be smooth and elastic. Mine was not sticky at all. Let it sit in the bowl, covered for 15 minutes. Divide it into 8 pieces, roll into 10" snakes. Wet the ends and form into rings. Place on a floured baking sheet, cover and let rise 15 minutes.

Boil the bagels, 4 at a time in 4 quarts of water, 1 Tbls sugar, and 1 tsp salt Place the boiled bagels on an ungreased baking sheet and bake 20 minutes at 425 degrees. I made them again a few days later using another recipe (just as easy) that contained no oil (fat-free bagels!). I might have to make both at the same time to see which we really like better. This time, however, I made some mini-bagels which are a better suited size for my younger kids. I rolled the snakes 6 inches long.

Visit Mouth Watering Mondays here
Monday Recipe Swap here.
Homemaker Mondays here
Try it Tuesday here
Tightwad Tuesday here
We will undoubtedly have more bagels often this week.