DROP THAT THING IMPERSONATING A BAGEL!!

DROP THAT THING IMPERSONATING A BAGEL!!!

When I was five years old, I had my first bagel. Our family was on its way to a camp in upstate New York and we had to drive around New York City to get there. We stopped at a Jewish Bakery on the outskirts of the city and my dad ran in and bought six bagels, one for each of us. After that first bite of my bagel, I never ate anything so slow in all my life….I savored every single chewy bite of goodness….and thus began my lifelong obsession with BAGELS.

My mother, while we were growing up, bought bagels from the freezer section at the grocery store because we did not have access to a Jewish Bakery where we lived. They were less than edible but we ate them anyways. When I was in high school, grocery stores started to make them in their bakeries but they were just a step up from the freezer bagels, way too dry and bready and not nearly as chewy or even close to the Jewish Bakery bagel. Then, when my husband and I were still young newlyweds living in a sketchy apartment above a dinghy video store in a small South Jersey town, a tiny “gourmet” food shop opened across the street from us. One morning, my hubby said that we should go check this “gourmet” shop out and see what they offered. So, we took a walk across the street and to my pleasant surprise….the owner made fresh bagels along with raspberry and cream cheese filled croissant rolls and other pastries for breakfast time and various dinner dishes that you could carry home and heat up. I only cared about the bagels. For the next two years, we breakfasted on hot bagels with cream cheese and hazelnut coffee whenever we had two extra dimes to rub together. Ohh….they were so good! But, bye and bye, the little shop closed and I was once again fresh bagel-less!

Over the years since then, I have tried bagels from every shop whose path I crossed that offered them ….finding decent ones here and there, but never as good as the Jewish Bakery bagel from my childhood. In the last ten years, I have searched and researched bagel recipes, trying each one, discarding some, tweaking others, mixing others together, making my own additions and subtractions. I seriously have come up with the best homemade bagel recipe….and let me tell you…no bagel anywhere will taste as good as the one you make yourself when it first comes out of the oven….NONE! Friends cannot resist them, husbands love them, kids devour them….and YOU will never be happier to sit down with a hot cup of hazelnut coffee or whatever coffee you choose, and bite into a freshly baked bagel….made by your own hands.

So, I am going to share my recipe – even though my recipes to me are like gold to a miser, but even Scrooge ended up sharing in the end, right? I hope someone out there who is like me and has an obsession with bagels will try this recipe and find it amazing. Don’t be afraid by the length of it….it is all in stages and will go faster than you think and will totally be worth it!

SALLIE ANN’S PRECIOUS BAGEL RECIPE

3 c. hot tap water

1 T. and 1 tsp. honey

3 T. and 1 tsp. dark Karo syrup

2 T. yeast

5 to 7 cups of unbleached all purpose flour and bread flour (see recipe for divisions)

2 t. salt

Boiling water

1 and ½ T. of raw sugar

Butter

Cornmeal

Pour 3 cups of hot water into a large mixing bowl. Add the honey and dark corn syrup and stir to dissolve. Sprinkle yeast over water and stir to dissolve. Wait for yeast to begin to grow (bloom). Once yeast has bloomed, add 3 cups of bread flour and 2 t. of salt and stir until sticky dough is formed. Add remaining flour ½ cup at a time (you may not need all the rest of the flour) mixing thoroughly, just until dough no longer clings to side of bowl. Dump dough onto floured counter and knead until dough is no longer sticky, adding a little flour after each few knead turns until dough is soft and elastic. Place dough in a large buttered bowl. Cover with a warm, wet tea towel and let rise for about 40 minutes or until doubled in bulk. Do not punch dough down, just dump dough onto a lightly floured counter. Cut the dough into 16 equal pieces. Form each dough piece into a ball by turning the edges underneath and inward. Once a smooth ball is formed, poke your thumb through the center and work a hole into the middle until a ring is formed. Place bagels on a floured counter and let rise for about 20 minutes. While waiting for bagels to rise, preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Fill a Dutch oven or large pot ½ way with water. Add the raw sugar and bring the water to a boil. Once the water is boiling, reduce the heat until the water is just bubbly, not a full boil, but keep it lightly boiling. Prepare your pans by buttering 3 cookie sheets and lightly sprinkling them with cornmeal. By now, your bagels are ready for boiling. Beginning with the first bagel formed, drop two bagels at a time into the boiling water, cover them with the lid and boil for 20 seconds, flip the bagels, replace the lid and boil for another 20 seconds. Remove bagels to a towel and let drain for 10 seconds and then place on a cookie sheet (I can get 6 bagels per cookie sheet). Continue this process until all bagels are boiled. After the first cookie sheet is full, place it into the preheated oven and bake until golden. My oven takes 17 minutes per pan. Remove bagels from pan to cooling rack or eat hot out of the oven. Once the bagels are cool to touch, place in plastic bags and store in the freezer. When these bagels are taken out of the freezer to eat, microwave them for about 15 seconds or until thawed out and put in toaster oven either whole or sliced in half - they are just as good as the day you baked them. ENJOY!

These bagels make the best bagel sandwiches for lunch. Toast a bagel, butter one side, put cream cheese on the other, fry up some bacon or a couple of slices of hickory smoked ham and place on one side of the bagel. Put both sides together and WAAALLLLAAAA – lunch!! Yummy! We also use these bagels to make tuna salad and chicken salad sandwiches….the possibilities are endless!!