TWD- Pumpkin Bagels

I really love bagels. When I was in high school, we would go to lunch at Einsteins all the time. I loved bagel sandwiches. Then I went through my stage where I thought I shouldn't eat 500 calories of bread. Then I got married and while we were living in Virginia, I discovered Panera. And now I'm back to loving bagels (seriously, get the Cinnamon crunch with Hazelnut cream cheese).
This week's TWD is for bagels. Making bagels is time intensive and involves quite a few steps. First, you make the dough of yeast, sugar, shortening, salt and flour. I added about a 1/2 cup pumpkin puree and used half whole wheat flour. Once it's risen for about an hour, you refrigerate it overnight. Then you shape the dough into balls, poke a hole in it and pull it so it looks like a ring. I found it interesting how active the dough still is- in the picture below, all the bagels were shaped the same way, but the top left was shaped first and the bottom right last (I know, they're not on dishtowels. Sometimes I don't follow directions):

After they've been shaped you boil them for about 90 seconds. They come out looking like soggy, wrinkly doughnuts (again, I know there's no cornmeal under these (see above) :)).

Then you brush them with egg whites and sprinkle them with whatever. I chose sesame seeds for some and cinnamon sugar for the rest. 

These baked up beautifully and were so delicious. They had the signature chewy outside and had the perfect texture inside.

This was my lunch after they came out of the oven- ham, provolone, basil, tomatoes and olive oil. I couldn't wait to eat before taking the picture, ok? Don't judge me.

Heather has the recipe!