Thursday, January 8, 2009

Mmm... Lycopene

Since school begins again for me on Monday, I figured I had best get my brain away from the delights that are brioche, pie and cookies and turn to baking things that are slightly higher on the virtuosity scale. I also figured that if nothing else, what I made should at least be able to power my family and I through the work week, and that meant breakfasty goodness. My mom is a confirmed carb-a-holic (so I have to come by it honestly!) and loves a good bread with her lunch or sometimes as a mid-morning snack. In particular, she adores a hearty, whole grain bagel.

I had a project.

Now, bagel-making isn't all that hard or even that fancy... a fact that I was quite unaware of until I tried my hand at their creation! I had come across a delicious looking, sweet pumpkin bagel recipe over at Have Cake Will Travel a couple months ago and with a small surplus of the main ingredient lying wait in my freezer I made myself a plan. In the wake of all the previous kitchen disasters I had suffered recently, I was just a little hesitant to take on something so new and "scary", but a couple deep breaths later I fired up my trusty stand mixer and started kneading away.

The birth of the bagels was not without incident, however. The original recipe was written for a bread machine and used instant yeast - which I conveniently forgot in the process of copy/pasting the write-up to MS Word (I did, however, fix it for my copy here). Needless to say, I kind of forgot that 20 minutes does not a puffy bread make when regular yeast is concerned. Given that it was the second rise (I did give the dough 2 hours on it's first one, since our house is on the chilly side) I forged ahead with the shaping, boiling and baking. You can see that they came out looking all right indeed - just like bagels - and they passed the taste test with my mom with flying colours. Andrew (who ate his a couple days later) deemed them good but "bouncy" - he's said that of a few other things I've made and I'm not entirely sure what it means... bagels are supposed to be chewy so use your judgement (and slice and freeze any you don't scarf in a day or so).

With one day's worth of bagels (and the associated confidence) under my belt, I set about thinking about a new offering... Sun-Dried Tomato Bagels! They're Andrew's favourite kind, and our Timmy's doesn't carry them any more (nor does our Great Canadian Bagel) so he's been at a loss for some time. But how to make them? I didn't have any other real "basic" bagel recipes to go from (the pumpkin ones, due to the added puree, were too different from the plain dough kind) so I began searching. And searching.

Then I got smacked upside the head with an epiphany. Tomato paste! It's the same consistency as pumpkin puree... and I had some oven-dried tomatoes from this past summer to use up too! Simple swaps out and in and some chopped up tomatoes soaked in hot water later, and bagel batch #2 was in the works. I threw in black pepper, garlic and oregano too instead of the pumpkin pie spice from the other recipe. The dough smelled (and tasted!) like fresh pizza - a fact that drove our dog ever so slightly nuts, and also gave me another idea for a shredded cheese topping! I did half the batch with and half without, so that Andrew would have a choice when it came to eating them.

I'm also submitting these bagels to this month's The Heart of the Matter event, focusing on "Slimming Recipes" this time around. I know these are bagels, and therefore carby, but they are very low in fat, high fibre and fairly low calorie. Not to mention, these bagels are both high in lycopene, which "may significantly reduce the risk of heart disease... women with the highest levels of the antioxidant in their blood had a 34 per cent reduced risk of the disease compared to those with lower levels of the nutrient" (Nutraingredients).

So, if you made it down to this part of the post... congratulations!! Here are the recipes I used, and I do find it helpful to weigh the dough portions with these so you get even sizes (and even baking)... but I'm a little OCD that way. Eyeball it if you want.

Pumpkin-Spice Bagels
Makes 8 four-oz bagels
2/3 cups warm water, divided
3 tbsp brown sugar, divided
1 pkg dry active yeast
¾ cup pumpkin puree
3 cups whole wheat flour
4 tsp vital wheat gluten
1 tbsp pumpkin pie spice
½ tsp salt
2 tbsp honey
  1. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook, combine ¼ cup warm water, 2 tbsp of the brown sugar and the yeast. Let stand 10 minutes.
  2. Stir in remaining water and sugar, and pumpkin puree.
  3. Whisk together flour, gluten and spice, begin beating into the yeast mixture.
  4. Beat in salt. Dough will be very stiff.
  5. Knead 10 minutes with the mixer.
  6. Place in a clean, oiled bowl, cover and allow to rise 1 ½ hours or until doubled.
  7. Punch dough down, separate into 8 (4-oz) pieces.
  8. Let rest 10 minutes. Shape each piece into a ball, flatten slightly and use your fingers to poke a hole about 1 ½” wide in the middle. Rest, covered, for 30 minutes longer.
  9. Preheat oven to 400F, line 2 baking sheets with parchment or SilPat.
  10. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add honey.
  11. Place 2 bagels at a time into the water and let boil for 1 minute, flipping after 30 seconds.
  12. Scoop out with a slotted spoon and place on cookie sheet.
  13. Bake 20 minutes, one sheet at a time.
  14. Cool on a rack.
Amount Per Serving
Calories: 185.9
Total Fat: 0.9 g
Cholesterol: 0.0 mg
Sodium: 59.4 mg
Total Carbs: 39.2 g
Dietary Fiber: 5.8 g
Protein: 8.2 g

Two-Mato Bagels
Makes 8 (3.5-oz) bagels
15 sun-dried tomatoes (not packed in oil), chopped roughly
3/4 cup boiling water
1 tbsp sugar
1 package dry active yeast
1 (6-oz) can tomato paste
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 tbsp vital wheat gluten
1 tsp fine salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tbsp garlic powder
1/2 tbsp dried oregano
  1. Place the tomatoes in a small bowl, cover with boiling water.
  2. Let stand 15 minutes to soften. Drain, reserving all liquid.
  3. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook, combine the reserved tomato soaking liquid, sugar and yeast. Let stand 10 minutes, until foamy.
  4. Stir in tomato paste.
  5. Whisk together flours, gluten, salt, pepper, garlic and oregano, and begin beating into the yeast mixture about 1/4 cup at a time.
  6. Beat in soaked tomatoes. Dough will be very stiff.
  7. Knead 5-8 minutes with the mixer.
  8. Place in a clean, oiled bowl, cover and allow to rise 2 hours.
  9. Punch dough down and separate into 8 (3.5-oz) pieces.
  10. Let rest 10 minutes.
  11. Shape each piece into a ball, flatten slightly and use your fingers to poke a hole about 1 ½” wide in the middle.
  12. Rest, covered, for 45 minutes.
  13. Preheat oven to 400F, line 2 baking sheets with parchment or SilPat.
  14. Bring a large pot of water to a boil.
  15. Place 2 bagels at a time into the water and let boil for 1 minute, flipping after 30 seconds.
  16. Scoop out with a slotted spoon and place on cookie sheet.
  17. Bake 20 minutes, one sheet at a time.
  18. Cool on a rack.
Amount Per Serving
Calories: 196.2
Total Fat: 1.0 g
Cholesterol: 0.0 mg
Sodium: 173.6 mg
Total Carbs: 41.1 g
Dietary Fiber: 5.4 g
Protein: 8.3 g

6 comments :

  1. I've been badly wanting to make bagels but I have no self control with carbs. I have some homemade sun dried tomatoes from the summer that would be great in your bagel recipe, maybe I can try and halve the recipe.

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  2. Thank you for this interesting recipe and for participating in the HotM!

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  3. Pumpkin spice bagels! How delish. You make it sound so easy.

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  4. I have always wanted to make bagels, they are definitely on the list for this year.
    I especially like the two-mato ones! They would make an awesome BLT.
    Thanks so much for your kindness and caring about my pup.
    I just realized that we are neighbours, I am one town to the west! Keep warm.

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  5. That looks so good! Thanks for posting it.

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Thanks for the feedback!