Cranberry pecan bread and bagels. Precise edition

You guys should be proud!!  I'm actually writing down a recipe with specific measurements and specific instructions instead of just making it however I want.  (I am not promising you I will do it this way twice, this is just how I usually do it.) 

• Ingredient list:
• 1/2 C Bulgar wheat soaked in 2 C water
• 2 1/4 tsp fast rise yeast
• 1 T sugar
• 2 C warm water
• 1/3 C finely minced pecans (measure pre-chop)
• 1/3 C dried cranberries
• 1/3C all purpose flour
• 2 Tbl canola oil
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/3 C wheat flour to start  (2 C Total)
•  4 C All purpose flour for the kneading stage. 
• 2 tbl Canola oil for coating while rising.
• Extra oil/flour for covering your hands while working with the dough

1/2 C Bulgar wheat soaked in 2 C water

 (I use Bob's Red Mills fast cooking Bulgar wheat.)  Let it soak for at least an hour, longer if the kernels are still tough.  You can do this before you go to work, the night before or the morning, just refrigerate them after they're puffy if you're going to put off baking to avoid growing things.

• 2 1/4 tsp fast rise yeast
• 1 T sugar
• 2 C warm water

Set this stuff up in the mixing bowl.  If you're wondering, that's one envelope of yeast, I just buy it in bulk.  Go do something else for a few minutes, say, chop nuts.  Let the yeast mixture getting all creamy looking.

• 1/3 c finely minced pecans (measure pre chop)
• 1/3 c dried cranberries
• 1/3 c all purpose flour

 Chop the pecans up very fine.  You will regret using more than this because of all the other stuff we're folding into the bread.   Trust me.  I really love pecans.    I would use more if I could get away with it.





 Mix pecans, dried cranberries, and all purpose flour together in a separate bowl to coat with flour. Mix flour, cranberries and nuts together.   Then add Bulgur wheat.  I'm not sure this matters but I do it anyway to help it blend better.

• 2 Tbl canola oil
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/3 C wheat flour to start  (2 C Total)

This is only about a third of the mixture

  Add 1/3 cup wheat flour to the yeast.   Mix.   Add 1/3 c wheat flour to the yeast, mix again.   At this point, add the wheat cranberry nut flour mixture to the bowl.  Mix again.  Add another 1/3 c wheat flour, mix again,   gradually adding another cup of wheat flour.  

When finished

About halfway through

Mix on high speed until well blended.  Remove mixing paddle and install dough hook and flour guard.  Gradually add about four cups all purpose flour.    You need to knead this stuff FOREVER, wheat bread is hard to work with.  In another words, about fifteen to twenty minutes.

Clean your kitchen table thoroughly and pour 2 tbl Canola oil on it in two pools.  Turn out dough.  Use the dough to spread the oil around the table, coat.  Then cover with two sheets of plastic wrap.  Cover with kitchen towels.  Let rise about two hours or until double in size.  You can also leave it until you get back from running an errand but it might rise off the edge of the table so be careful.  A related matter, you can let it rise in a bowl but it WILL overflow.  This is a lot of bread.   Make sure it's a massive one if you try it that way.

I call it the blob

hiding under there

After about two hours, or in my case, three, it will  be at least doubled in size.   This recipe is for a ton of bread.  I freeze the extra and keep it in the fridge because there are no preservatives.  It will mold if you don't pay attention.



First things first, OIL YOUR HANDS.   Punch the dough down and make balls about the size of your palm.  Get it as smooth as you easily can and punch a hole in it.  This is your bagel.  Make 12, set aside and let rest for ten minutes. 

what's left after bagels

my dough balls

While the bagels are resting, it's time to make your bread.  You can do whatever you want with it.  I divided it into six sections and made bagguettes.  One "family" sized and three in two serving size. 

 Roll them out gently if you want a braided bread and twist the two sections to form a braid.  This is for the smaller loaves.




For the family sized loaf I rolled it out in thirds and braided them.  Be careful to the ends under so it'll look good. 

 

Sometime during all this prepare a sauce pan with water and about two teaspoons of salt.   Turn the heat on high and get it going to a rolling boil.  Get a slotted spoon and boil the bagels, two at a time, one minute on each side.  This will make them shiny and chewy.  Bake for twenty minutes at 450F or until they sound hollow when you tap on them.

 

YUMMY

Let the loaves rise for about forty minutes or until you lose patience.  Depending on the desired look, you can score the loaves that aren't braided with a serrated knife.  Bake @ 350F or until golden brown and hollow when you tap on them.  Brush with butter if desired, butter with sugar if you want it to be sweeter and enjoy.

Zeal Wellness protein shakes

Quick update: I have to get to the office, but... yesterday ended up being a calorie disaster.  I can't say it was because of the shake lunch because it wasn't.  If I had to put a finger on it, I'd say it was the stress of having an appointment with a plastic surgeon today (I have a lipoma, i.e. fatty tumor in my arm that's bugging me.  For my whoovian friends, A lipoma is a benign tumor composed of adipose tissue, or the cutest little monster ever.), getting my roof redone, and the funeral of a long time neighbor on Saturday.  All this produced an angry gut, which made me stressed out, which makes a sister overeat.

I'm going to try it again today with a twist.  Instead of loading up this morning with a yogurt smoothie, I just did my usual homemade bagel and Zeal Wellness with water.   Lunch, I'm going to do a plain old chocolate protein shake and maybe a granola bar.    More later. 

Somebody has to get her hair and makeup done before work. :)

Bagels and Bread, the Cranberry edition

Last weekend I decided I wanted Cranberry bagels.   I wasn't sure how this was going to turn out, but it was pretty good so I'll share the recipe:

The Dough:

2 C. Warm Water
1 envelope instant yeast
2 Tbl white sugar

Let this hang out on the counter for about ten minutes until it's good and frothy if you're feeling ambitious.   Otherwise, just mix thoroughly.

Add the following ingredients in order

1 Tbl canola oil
1 tsp salt
1 C. Whole wheat flour.   (I used White whole wheat flour)
1 package dried cranberries from Walgreens.  (3/4 C) 
4-5 C all purpose flour.

Knead about forever with the dough hook on the kitchen aid stand mixer.   I think I spent about 20 minutes at it.    Just make sure the gluten is fully developed.   The dough should feel nice and smooth, not too sticky.  Coat dough in oil (more Canola) and place in a glass/non metal bowl, cover with plastic wrap and a kitchen towel and leave in a warm place.  I put it on my stove top with the hood light on for added warmth.  

Let rise for two hours, or till the dough is double in size.  I waited until mine was grazing the top of the plastic wrap that I put on the bowl. 

Prepare a cookie sheet by covering it in aluminum foil if you don't enjoy trying to scrub anti stick spray off them like me and coat with the non stick spray.  Take the dough out of the bowl and punch down.  Grab a handful of it and roll up to form a ball, punch a hole in it to form a bagel.  I made twelve medium sized bagels from the dough this way.  You can make more or less as desired.

After forming the bagels, boil about two quarts of water with several teaspoons of salt while the bagels rest about ten minutes.    While they are resting, take the remaining dough and form a loaf with it.   I put it in the same bowel I let the dough rise in and baked it in that when it was done rising but make sure it's oven safe before you try that.

Let rise about an hour or until double in size.   Score with a serrated knife.  If desired (You don't have to, but it was delicious), melt one table spoon of unsalted butter with one teaspoon of sugar and baste all over the unbaked bread.   Leave no drop of butter in your cup.  Bake at 350F for 20 minutes or until done.   It will sound hollow when you knock on it if done.

But back to the bagels:

Now that the water is boiling, add your bagels three at a time to the boiling salt water.   Let boil about one minute on each side, remove with a slotted spoon and place on the cookie sheet.   Repeat with all bagels.    Bake the bagels at 450F for about 15-20 minutes or until they are pretty and sound hollow when you knock on them.  

The finished product:

Here is the nutrition info based on my estimates from myfitnesspal.com.  Bear in mind, I assumed a third of the loaf of bread was a serving because I LOVE bread.

Recipe name

Number of servings

Serves  people

Ingredients	Calories	Carbs	Fat	Protein	Fiber	Sat Fat
Walmart Great Value - All Natural Dried Cranberries, 0.75 cup	293	74	0	0	5	0
Best Choice - All Purpose Flour, 4 cup	1,600	352	0	48	16	0
Gold Medal - Unbleached All-Purpose Wheat Flour - White, 1 cup	400	88	0	12	2	0
Wesson - Canola Oil, 3 tablesppon	360	0	42	0	0	3
Sugar - White Granulated Sugar, 8 teaspoon	120	32	0	0	0	0
Add Ingredient

Total:	2773	546	42	60	23	3
Per Serving:	185	36	3	4	2	0

Happy baking!!   Have a great week.

Bread, glorious bread

I am almost out of the super special wheat bagels I made last time I posted.   I am not out of bread... just bagels, which means I need to make something I can share with my girls this week for breakfast.

I'm conducting an experiment.  I'm taking the poolish from one recipe and mixing it into another and making bagels out of it.

The poolish contained:

•  1/2 teaspoon instant yeast
•  1/2 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
•  3/4 cup whole wheat flour

Per the instructions, I mixed this up yesterday evening, covered it with a damp cloth, and left it until this morning when I decided to deviate from the instructions and leave it covered on my kitchen stove for the rest of the day so the flavor could develop.   

After I beat it down, it looked like: 

I took out my trusty circa 1988 Kitchen Aid stand mixer proceeded to follow the bread recipe from the nice Israeli lady who helped me start all this for the bagels. 

Note: I only used what was left in the yeast envelope for the yeast  because the rest o f it was in the Poolish.  

I took: 

2 c. warm tap water

remaining yeast

2 tbl sugar

and mixed them up with the paddle attachment   I let that sit for a minute while I got my leftover burnt pizza and put it in the microwave.   Then I added 2 c. All purpose flour and the Poolish and mixed that up. I gradually added a total of 5 c. all purpose flour.   Give or take some until it looks right.   After it was all blended, I switched to the dough hook, and began gradually mixing and kneading all this.   I'd say we're talking about twenty minutes mixing and kneading. 

Various stages: 

In the beginning, there was mush. 

I added more flour: 

Action shot with the dough hook. 

Non action shot.  Note it still looks moist and kind of mushy.  This is before I added the last two or three cups of flour.   

This is with most of the flour in the mix.  Note how the gluton is starting to develop and give the dough body. 

Another action shot.   I've noticed when I'm making bread in the kitchen aid mixer that turning the speed up to full power so all the dough spins off the hook helps mix it more thoroughly.   It's also a lazy way to clean off whatever attachment you're using.  :) 

Once the dough is nice and developed, I oiled a nice not metal bowel for the first rise with canola oil.   I rolled the dough in the canola oil and covered it up on my kitchen stove to rise for about two hours or until it doubles in size. 

 Right now, I'm taking a break waiting on the bread to rise.  I just enjoyed my reward for coming straight home from work and mixing up bread dough so I can go to bed at a decent hour.

In a probably ill advised mood I'm going to rock the exercise bike for 30 minutes while I wait. 

As it turns out, not terribly ill advised.   The bread is still rising.  I didn't fall off and I feel pretty good (from working out.). 

Two hours later...  I rolled the bread up into a ball and punched holes in it.  Let it rest about ten minutes and then boiled it about two minutes on each side.

I think the cracking means I did it right.

Twenty minutes later and we have bagels.  They're done when you can knock on them and they sound hollow. 

Two cents for the day:   Bread was pretty good with the poolish.  Not entire sure it mattered but it is tasty.  

I think it might have just been that little bit of wheat flour in the dough that made the difference.