Bready Bagel

I took a little break from blogging to celebrate my graduation. Three years of on and off studying and procrastination have come to an end with a walk up the stage and a hand shake with the dean. College is just a wonderful piece of chocolate chip cookie. You don't realize you've gobbled the whole thing up until  you see some lonely crumbs floating in your glass of milk. Flipping through my Facebook albums (I can't remember when was the last time I developed photos), I realized how little I've changed in appearance yet I'm a different person.

My greatest accomplishment in college is to embrace my love for baking, and most important of all motivating myself to start Chez Ma Cuisine. In a month I would be moving ma petite cuisine to start my post-graduation life!

To commemorate my college life I decided to make bagels. Plain, simple bagels that accompanied me through countless mornings. They are everywhere on campus. You can find them in the cafeteria, behind glass boxes at every cafe. I couldn't finish a whole bagel back then. Everything in America is so HUGE. Bagel back in Asia are the size of my palm. I felt wasteful throwing away the bottom half of my bagel. But the top half is absolute heaven when I toast them slightly and spread a thin layer of cream cheese. That reminds me of how frightened I was of cream cheese. What kind of devil's food has both cream and cheese in it!

A filling breakfast on the go

I don't remember when I finished my first whole bagel, but those American bagels aren't so big after all. If it weren't for the bagels on campus I probably would have starved in many many boring ass classes.

I googled for bagel recipes online, and picked Sophisticated Gourmet's New York-Style Bagel Recipe. It's a one-day bagel recipe, so it doesn't require you to make a sponge. You start off by dissolving the yeast in water, then kneading the dough together. For some reason, my dough wasn't sticky at all. After I let it rise in the oven for an hour, I couldn't form little balls. The dough just push away from each other.

The end result was tasty despite having to work with some stubborn dough. I'm definitely going to try the two-day method to see if I can correct the dough this time. Once again homemade taste so much better than store bought.

Bagel's interior texture

This recipe produces a good interior texture as store bought ones. What it lacks is a bit of chewiness. The outer shell is hard and the inside soft. I prefer my bagel to be more chewy. If you like bready bagels then definitely try this recipe at the link above.

Cream cheese and tayberry jam