Now that we’re a few solid days into February it seemed appropriate that I acknowledge the fine dusting of flour on the floor, walls and furniture that is my loosely stated New Year’s resolutions.
I had been lamenting the lack of variation in my sourdough adventures and looking forward to a year of bread-based experimentation in the form of baked goods like doughnuts, English muffins and bagels.
So, it’s good that I can report I’ve checked at least one of those items off my list: bagels.
My initial attempt at making bagels — not just sourdough bagels, but bagels, period — full stop was based on a blurry-lined recipe I found online that was dancing between a New York style versus a Montreal-style bagel.
Sweetened, dry dough. Slow rise. Thick and chewy exterior.
The Ingredients
200g active sourdough starter
360g warm tap water
635g bread flour
30ml honey
12g salt
60g granulated sugar
10ml baking soda
1 egg white, whisked
sesame seeds, to taste
The flour, water, salt, starter, and honey went together just as I would have usually put together a basic bread dough. Blend. Hydrate. Fold. Rest. Fold. Repeat. And finally into the fridge for about 16 hours.
Things changed up on the back end, when after I let the dough warm back up for about an hour, I weighed out twelve equal(ish) portions and shaped into rings. The dough being fairly dry, this was a tough thing to do, at least in as much as I was hoping for smooth, beautiful loops. I wound up with scraggly rings that evened out a bit as they rose but even after twelve hours on the counter still bore my (trademark?) handmade look.
A pot of boiling water to which the granulated sugar and baking soda joined in to make a sweet alkaline broth gave each of the bagels, two at a time in my medium pot, a thirty-second-per-side bath before landing on a parchment-lined baking sheet.
A quick egg white wash on the top and a generous sprinkle of sesame seeds, and the dozen bagels were into the 450F oven for a solid 20 minutes before extraction.
They definitely had a homemade look, but the kid — a bagel aficionado already at age fourteen — scarfed two and declared them worthy. I guess I’m going to need to keep that recipe handy for another batch soon.