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Amazon sells Lenders Plain Bagels, Refrigerated, 2.85-Ounce (Pack of 12) for $61.25 a case - 12 packages, each of which contains 6 bagels. You will be delighted that you did.
Several people who blog online have raved about the bagel recipe, so that was the first I tried - and I've been producing a batch of bagels about every third day since. I've tried bagels before only to have them fall apart in the boiling pan.
The The Bread Baker's Apprentice: Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread has long been on my wish list, so I was delighted to have it magically appear under the Christmas tree with my name on it. If you buy this book only for this one recipe, buy the Bread Baker's Apprentice.
Not so Peter Reinhart's. These are the best bagels ever - and the easiest too.
BTW, one batch of bagels (I make 24 "minis" - which are really the size of packaged bagels such as Lender's) costs about $1.25. I figure I more than covered the cost of the book on the second batch of bagels.
Not only does the author give dozens of excellent recipes, he also spends a lot of time talking about the science behind bread. You can skip this part if you want, but it also helps you troubleshoot when you're having a problem. I would recommend this book to anyone who's interested in cooking their own bread.
If you want to be a really good home baker, this book is what you have to have in your library. Do you want to astonish with art of making any kind of bread, you should buy this book. Easy understand how to make breads.
I can't recommend this book enough - it covers both the theory and practice of making bread, with a wide variety of recipes. I'm really just starting out with bread-making but I already feel like I can look at recipes and get a feel for how they will turn out, and I'm feeling at liberty to adjust things and they usually turn out how I expect them to.If you're at all interested in breadmaking be sure to pick this up - you really can't go wrong.
At first I thought the hydration issue was due to the fact that I have to adjust recipes for the fact that I don't use Bakers yeast but I have many many years experience with baking and haven't really had these problems before. This is a very good book, I want to say that before I add this criticism because I really don't want to discourage anyone from buying it. I guess I initially failed to properly scrutinize Peters recipes becasue he has such a fine reputation that is certainly warranted. The only Issues I have with this book is that the recipe proportions can be a little off, especially considering hydration. I also found when I used the recipes exactly as shown I often came up short on the weights and found that very often the individual ingedient weights do not add up to the advertised final weights. I would suggest using less liquid than shown and adjusting up as needed for the hydration issue and checking the wieghts before starting until you have used them a few times to avoid these issues. Peter's later books don't seem to have these problems,
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