Time To Make The Bagels

Remember a long time ago when some of us were in college and we were downtown and there was a sign up about some bagel store opening? I think it was near where Amici’s is now. That was the time that I was looking for a job and we saw a sign for “BAGEL MAKER WANTED” and the hours were something like 3AM-7AM every morning.

I thought it sounded like the best job ever, but then I remembered that I didn’t know how to make bagels and that I really probably didn’t want to get up that early and actually go anywhere.

Well, I still don’t want to get up that early, but I can add BAGEL MAKER to my growing list of accomplishments.

I got inspired this weekend when I was complaining on twitter about the lack of good bagels in Athens since Zim’s closed. One of my twitter friends, @bethoshea, posted that she tried making her own bagels and it was super easy. She sent me this link and I thought I would give it a shot.

You basically mix up 4 cups bread flour, 1 Tbls sugar, 1 1/2 tsps salt, 1 Tbls vegetable oil, 2 tsps instant yeast, and 1-1/2 cups of warm water and knead it for 10 minutes.

This gives you a giant ball of bagel which you then make into 8 smaller bagel balls.

Let these sit and mutate and grow for a while. I let them go for about 15-20 minutes before I started trying to make them bagel shaped.

I didn’t really get the next part down during my first bagel making experience. You are supposed to roll them out like a snake, then wrap it around your hand and knead it back into a bagel/donut shape.

I had limited success but for the most part, it was OK.

Scrappy asked why I couldn’t just poke a hole in the middle. I think I might test that next time on a few and see how it works.

Then, comes the part that everyone associates with it being a REAL bagel. The boiling.

Let the bagels sit for another 20 minutes and start boiling the water and pre-heating the oven to 425.

Then drop them in and let them go for about 2 minutes.

This is the point that I was fairly embarrassed about the look of my bagels. But, hey, they taste the same no matter how they look, right?

Then it is in the oven for 10 minutes, flip them, 10 more minutes.

If everything goes well (which it did), you should have shiny fresh bagels at the end.

I am going to attempt an everything bagel next time. And then will come the clouds and bunny cheerleader tables and the closing of Zim’s might hurt a little less.