Yeah, it turns out that this is the major difference between bagels and bread. Boiling is what gives it that smooth surface, and it helps the dough to rise too.
I'd imagine so, and wheat bagels are indeed yummy too. You may need to adjust the ratio of water to flour, but as long as you wind up with a really stiff, elasticky dough it should be fine. I'd also recommend lowering the oven temp. This recipe may be of some help: http://www.cdkitchen.com/recipes/recs/270/Whole-Wheat-Bagels94258.shtml
I tried a bagel recipe on saturday morning and i totally failed. The boiling part seemed to be where the problem was. I'm not sure why..it just doesn't seem...right LOL
I may try again, but i do hate having to boil them. Is there another way?
I've seen certain recipes that have you bring the water to a full boil, then down to just barely a simmer before adding the bagels. I personally have had more luck with a really fast boil and a full minute on each side, but you could always experiment with different times/temps and see what works best for you. The molasses helps a lot for me--it gives the bagels extra color, flavor, and shine. Did the bagels puff up a lot towards the end of boiling? If not, maybe the recipe didn't have you boil them long enough. Without the puffing, they can come out looking pretty weird and not be exactly done.
You could certainly skip the boiling part, but then what you get is more like bagel-shaped bread. Still yummy, but not exactly bagels.
The recipe i used from allrecipes.com had you boil them for 7 minutes. They just seems really water logged and they didn't really puff up that much and they were very solid and heavy after baking. Not like any bagel I've ever had. YOu couldn't even really cut them..they just seemed like wet dough. This recipe calls for only boiling a minute so I don't know if that will make a difference. I'm going to try it again, but i'm not very hopeful.
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i should eat this everyday
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This recipe may be of some help: http://www.cdkitchen.com/recipes/recs/270/Whole-Wheat-Bagels94258.shtml
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I may try again, but i do hate having to boil them. Is there another way?
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Did the bagels puff up a lot towards the end of boiling? If not, maybe the recipe didn't have you boil them long enough. Without the puffing, they can come out looking pretty weird and not be exactly done.
You could certainly skip the boiling part, but then what you get is more like bagel-shaped bread. Still yummy, but not exactly bagels.
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