Honey Wheat Bagels

Discouraged by a lack of whole wheat everything bagels in the market, I decided to venture out to make my own. Turns out they are not all that time consuming, expensive, or difficult. Give yourself an hour and you'll be wondering why you haven't been making these all along.

On a personal note: It's been awhile since I've posted. It's been a busy couple of weeks for me as we've renovated the kitchen.

I've also planted some fall veggies - red cabbage and white cauliflower. So, expect my favorite recipes for those two in about 55 days!

Now, let's get to the bagels!

Step One: Gather Your Ingredients

Oh and if you want to make everything bagels, like I did, you'll need:

You could also use onion and garlic powder, but I prefer the real thing. So, dice 1/2 an onion (Vidalias are still in season) and cook in 1 t of olive oil until they look like this:

 Drain on a paper towel. I tried to put this on my bagels after the seasonings but had trouble getting it to stick. So, next time, I am going to simply mix the sauteed onions into my cream cheese! Yum!

Now, to the bagels!



Step Two: Bagel Dough

Mix together 2 cu of the whole wheat flour, the salt, and the dry yeast. Slowly add in the warm water and 3 T of the honey and mix well. Gradually add in the remaining flour. Note: my dough only needed an additional 2 cu - it should have a sticky texture but form into a single ball of dough.

Flour your hands and the surface you plan to knead on. Knead the dough for about 5 minutes until it is smooth and elastic. Form it into a ball and return it to the bowl:

Cover with a towel and let it rest for 10 minutes.

When the 10 minute nap is up, divide your dough into 12 equal parts. Shape each part into a ball and stick your finger in the middle to create the bagel shape.

Assemble your formed bagels on 2 sheet pans doctored with your favorite method of nonstickery (butter, nonstick spray, parchment paper, silicon, etc). Let the bagels sit, uncovered for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, start a large pot of water to boil.



Step Three: Broil, Boil, & Bake

After the 20 minute rest is up, turn on your broiler. Broil your bagels for 2 minutes on each side. You will need to do this for each sheet, so that they sit on the uppermost rack. Keep an eye on these, the second round may not need a full 2 minutes as the oven is quite hot by then. If they start to turn in color, they are ready to come out!

Post Broiler

Stir the last 1 T of honey into your now boiling water.Add enough bagels to the pot to cover the surface. Turn the heat down and simmer for 3 minutes. Flip the bagels over and simmer for 4 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 375˚ F.

Once done, return your bagels to the sheet pan. When they are just cool enough to touch, but still a little sticky, dip the tops of the bagels into the seasoning mixture:

I made 6 of my bagels everything and 6 plain honey whole wheat.

Bake at 375˚ F for 20 - 25 minutes until the tops are golden brown. You can put both sheet pans in the oven at once this time, but you may want to rotate and flip the pans 1/2 through.

While they don't have quite the chewiness of a lye-cooked bagel, they are still darn good. And you know what's in them! And while the initial investment of the ingredients (especially the seasonings if you don't have them) might be a bit more than the average bagel, per recipe they work out to about 23 cents a bagel!

The Everything Bagels were made for onion cream cheese and the honey whole wheat ones go great with Trader Joe's Valencia Peanut Butter with Roasted Flaxseeds.

Make these but be warned - if you share, everyone will be asking you to make more!

Enjoy!