Bagels Experiment
What's fun about working with natural yeast is that I can throw together anything and just play around.So I just watched a couple of videos on bagels, and made 4 bagels of my own.The photos are from my phone, so they're not very clear.
The bagels came out just the way I wanted them. I've never been to NYC, or even to a real DELI, so I had nothing to "work with" in terms of achieving an example. These were tasty, chewy, and crispy.
It's spongy on the inside, incredibly crisp on the outside, chewy, but not too chewy. The very best thing about this is that it is not dry at all, but moist.
A pinch of homemade yeast
Sprinkle store yeast
AP flour
Wheat gluten
Water
Next day: salt, molasses, flour. Knead and rise. Shape and rise. Boil in Chinese alkali water. Bake in toaster oven on "high". Crazy...
Comments
Sorry .......for some reason when I post the site doubles it for some reason.
crazy bagel path there is no escape! I'm converting my fbagel ormula over to Chinese Alkali Water right now and heading off to Lee Lee's Chinese market to get some :-)
Happy New Year!
Oh dear! I hope I didn't mean it in the wrong way. I put a generous splash of alkali water in the boiling water, but definately it wasn't 100% alkali as that would be terribly bitter. Please don't put any alkali water in the dough. It's horribly bitter. I'm sorry if I made it sound that way, I hope it isn't too late!
I haven't been able to find the lye bagels are historically boiled in and alkali water is nothing but lye water. Never thought about looking for it a Chinese grocery store so it is off to my favorite place to shop and get some as I have bagels on the bake list for tomorrow.
I too hope no one ever puts lye inside their bagels since it is so caustic.