Exotic (sort of) Baking

Did you know you can make your own bagels? And pocket pita bread? I didn't. I mean I guess I figured you could, but I'd never really heard of anyone making them and never really thought about it much. But back a couple weeks ago, when I was sick and had intense cravings for all things doughy, I sought out some bagels in this town, and was sorely disappointed. So I flipped through the pages of "The Best Recipe" book and found a recipe for bagels. It called for high gluten flour, which I didn't have. I know that the Irish flour is made from some different strain of wheat that makes it extra low in gluten anyway. It makes great pie crust but not great bread.


But I did have a sack of wheat gluten from the time I made seitan. So I replaced a half a cup of the flour with the wheat gluten and this is what I got:

They tasted as good as they looked. Yeasty and doughy, crispy and chewy, toasted and smeared with cream cheese. They were perfect. Really. Best bagels I've ever eaten. I made them again last night but they didn't turn out as well. I didn't "retard" them long enough in the refrigerator and I ran out of all purpose flour so I threw in a little whole wheat. I may have shorted them on the gluten too. They are still better than anything I can buy here, but not as good as my first attempt. Anyway, so here is the recipe for anyone that wants to try it.

4 cups high gluten flour (or 3 1/2 cups flour and 1/2 cup gluten)

2 teaspoons salt

1 T barley malt syrup of powder (I used rice syrup and it worked fine, maybe honey would work too?)

1 1/2 t dry yeast

1 1/4 cups lukewarm water

3 T cornmeal for dusting baking sheet

Mix flour salt and malt together in stand mixer. Add yeast and water and mix for about 12 minutes until dough is smooth and stiff. Divide into 8 portions, roll into smooth balls and let rest covered for 5 minutes. Roll each ball into a rope about 11 inches long. Overlap ends by 1 inch and insert your hand in the hole in the middle and roll the overlap together between your hand and the work surface until sealed. Place the bagels on a cornmeal dusted tray and cover tightly with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 12-18 hours for retarding. (This gives the dough a change to ferment and allows the bagels to brown nicely thanks to the Maillard reaction). About 20 minutes before you want to bake the bagels remove them from the fridge. Adjust oven rack to the center and heat the oven to 450 degrees. Fill a large pot with 3 inches deep of water and bring to a boil. Submerge 2 or 3 bagels at a time for 30 seconds and remove to wire rack with a slotted spoon to drain. Transfer to baking sheet and bake until golden brown and crisp, about 14 minutes. Transfer to a rack to cool.

The other recipe is pocket pita bread. I used spelt flour, just in an attempt to add some variety to our diet. Here's the recipe. It is from King Arthur's Whole Grain Baking Book. (Much as I love this book, the whole wheat chocolate chip cookies are disgraceful)

1 cup unbleached all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon instant yeast

1 cup warm water

3/4 t salt

1 1/2 t olive oil

1 1/2 cups whole spelt flour

Combine all purpose flour and yeast in a bowl with the water. Stir until smooth, cover and let rest for 10 minutes-2 hours. Sprinkle salt over the dough stir in oil. Add 1 cup of spelt flour and stir until dough gathers up. Add more spelt if necessary but try not to make a dry dough. Knead the dough until smooth, 8 minutes. (best to knead by hand as spelt gluten is delicate) Grease a bowl, place dough in and cover to rest for about an hour. Preheat oven to 500 and place baking stone or sheet in the oven. Divide dough into 8 pieces. Flatten to a 6 inch circle using a floured rolling pin. Load to pitas at a time onto the hot stone. Bake for 3 minutes then flip over and bake for another 2 minutes. Stack the warm pitas together and wrap in a kitchen towel to keep them soft.

A couple f my pitas didn't go into "full balloon" so they didn't have much of a pocket. I think this is because I don't have a bakers peel or stone so my transfer to the oven was less than graceful and a couple of the pita's ended up draped over the edge of the overturned baking sheet. So they didn't all look great, but they wonderful stuffed with garlicky creamy hummus, crunchy cucumber, juicy tomatoes, and bitter parsley.