Bagels are for breakfast
I didn’t grow up in a place anywhere like New York City. My family isn’t Jewish. The first time I had a traditional style bagel, I was 19. Grocery bagels were never the same after that. It was chewy, flavorful and dramatically better than any bagel I had ever eaten. I went on a quest to figure out how to make them one day and stumbled across this recipe. It’s a process, but worth every moment when you don’t have access to bakery that supplies them.
Ingredients
Sponge
1 tsp yeast
4 C bread flour
2 1/2 C water
Dough
1/2 tsp yeast
3 C and 3/4 C bread flour
2 3/4 tsp salt
1 Tbsp malt syrup
1 Tbsp baking soda
cornmeal
toppings (sesame seeds, poppy seeds, dehydrated onion, etc)
Sweet dreams!
Mix together the sponge ingredients well and let rest covered (plastic wrap) for 2 hours.
Add yeast, 3 C flour, salt and syrup and knead for a few minutes until completely combined.
Add the remaining 3/4 C flour and knead about 10 minutes. The dough should be elastic and not too sticky.
Turn out the dough onto a floured surface and cut into 16–24 pieces. Obviously, the more pieces, the smaller your bagels will be.
Line a pan with parchment paper and spray lightly with oil.
Roll the dough into tight balls, place on pans and cover with damp towels. Let rise 20 minutes.
Pinch the center of the dough balls to make a bagel shape. Expand the circle of dough until it is the approximate size and shape you want it to be. I like my bagels thinner and wider, so that’s how I shaped them. The dough will expand somewhat, but don’t expect any drastic changes to take place. Let rise covered with damp towels 20 minutes.
Cover the bagels and damp towels with plastic wrap and place in the fridge overnight.
Good morning, sunshine!
Preheat your oven to 500 F and bring a large pot of water with 1 Tbsp baking soda to a boil. Before you get started, get out cornmeal and any toppings you desire. The bagels are much easier to handle when they are still cold, don’t worry about bringing them to room temperature.
Boil the bagels for 1 minute on each side.
Before replacing them on the pan, sprinkle a little cornmeal. While the bagels are still hot and wet, add any toppings.
Bake in the oven 5 minutes.
Rotate the pans and reduce heat to 450 and bake 5 minutes.
Let cool on a baking rack and enjoy!
