Bagels Baby!

See? I am keeping my promise. Even though it did not involve a pinky swear, serious and binding between my 12 year old daughter and I, here I am, exactly one week later.

Winter has truly arrived in the Bay Area, gentle rains have been coming every other day or so, and if this is this year's repeat of El Nino (that yes, I am old enough to actually have experienced and remember), I will take it.

I love the Fall the best of all the seasons. Weird for a chef. Most chef's, and even other folk who are serious about cooking love Spring, with its bounty of green garlic, asparagus, peas, and the beginnings of everything else showing their gorgeous little heads in gardens everywhere. They don't call it Spring Green for nothing! It is, in fact my favorite color....but I digress.

Many chefs embrace most ardently, Summer, when sweet berries and stone fruit rule the Farmers Markets. But not me. Perhaps it is because I attended culinary school, not in CA but back east in Providence RI, where I experienced my first and most gorgeous of Autumns. In fact, Autumn even has a specific smell...most East Coast folk will agree, and everyone else, well they just think I'm crazy. But that is okay. I have always had a very sensitive sense of smell...one of the reasons that I excel at my chosen profession I imagine.

But Winter....I love cosy vintage cashmere sweaters. I love fires in the fireplace (Ugh...don't start, people who I know and love in Berkeley), I love Christmas lights, and BAKING. Baking is my therapy. The more stressful my life, the more baked products my friends and family can count on. Bread is especially special to me. My dad being a baker in the Merchant Marines, my Mama baking homemade white dinner rolls each holiday, drenched in butter. But me, my fav is a crusty and chewy country loaf, made with a natural yeast starter or biga (Italian).

My version of Tartine Bread

I have had my current sourdough starter going about a year or so, a gift from my dear friend and colleague, Mary. Her husband Bob is quite the chef himself, and he has been maintaining his starter for a long time.

Just about every weekend, I bake bread for the coming week. I became serious about it when I took on yet another additional role at PUSD, that of a culinary instructor. After lunchtime, three days a week, I jump right in and instruct a class of 20 Juniors and Seniors in the skills and techniques of preparing food. One of which, of course, is bread.  We are so spoiled in the Bay Area, so many great folks making damn delicious bread around here. But just over 3 years ago, my family moved from Berkeley to Oakland. And like I said in my post last week, the area that I would be able to afford is pretty much a good food desert. I could no longer walk to pick up my weekly bread at Acme. So I started working ardently, on making a great loaf myself.

I tried lots of different formulas, wanting to find a bread that didn't take two days of loving manipulation to bring to the table and alas, after 6 months or so of pretty mediocre breads, I resigned myself to Chad Robertson's Country Loaf bible, Tartine Bread.  You really do get what you give, especially with naturally leavened country style breads. It is, to be very frank, a process.

Proofing the bagels

So committed I was to it, working ardently each weekend, at first wanting to see if I could shorten the process. I'm a professional after all! I should be able to make this process my own.....Nope. The breads I turned out were decidedly ok, and they tasted good, but the rise was not terrific, the texture too dense and I am so damn picky.

One weekend, I remember vividly, I sighed, and decided to do Chad's formula by the letter, ALL 37 PAGES. It took a week, following his precise instructions, to get my starter really nice and active. I was religious in the feeding schedule. Every am, weighing in grams the 100 degree water and organic local flours I fed my baby with. After a week, the health of my baby really was evident, and so I began.

That next weekend, I turned out the most perfect loaf of bread I had every baked in my entire life! I was exhilarated and addicted. From that day, every week, with very little exception, I have been baking my family's bread.

Now, I have to admit, I have not been a fan of the Bay's version of bagels in the past. Too puffy, too cakey and not chewy enough for me. So when I walked into Beauty's Bagel Shop on Telegraph Avenue in Oakland, my expectations were to bite into another hyped up, but mediocre product. Instead,  I revisited my own love for bagels that I found when I lived back East. They make Montreal style, wood fired bagels by hand each day, all of their spreads, to an extremely delicious result. Lucia especially, loves bagels (as any future student of NYU should), and Beauty's, though not producing NY style bagels, is the closest I have found in the Bay to delicious NY style fixings for bagels.

I have been sitting on the NYT formula for Montreal Bagels for quite awhile, I don't know why I decided to try them today. But I am sure glad I did. They came out a lovely golden brown, and my NY loving daughter, is enamored of the fact that we can make her favorite breakfast at home in about 2 hours.

Here are my notes:

Gorgeous finished product

*I halved the recipe, as 18 bagels is too much for my little family. Thusly I used just one whole, organic, free range egg and no yolk in my formula.
*I used roughly 1/2 cup of my sourdough starter, in addition to the yeast. I love the depth of flavor.
*I used extra virgin olive oil from Soul Food Farm.
*I used locally milled organic wheat bread flour from The Bale Grist Mill in St Helena.
*I found that 15-20 mins in the 450 degree oven, with a pizza stone was plenty of time to achieve a deep rich golden brown.
*I used parchment paper on the 1/2 size sheet pans to keep the bagels from sticking to the pan in the oven, as they are very sticky when they emerge from the honeyed boiling water.
*I decided not to roll my bagels in any accoutrement, as we prefer the bagels flavor to come though, although, next time I may caramelize a few onions to put on my husband's bagels

Sunday Breakfast

We have a tradition since moving to Berkeley.  On Friday night, to celebrate the end of the week we go out to dinner.  Not usually a fancy affair.....though we usually spend more on food than most families I imagine, we pay for quality and support good, local ingredients.  Neighborhood places, owned by hardworking people who are really focused on the food.  But I digress.

The second part of the weekend food celebration comes on Sunday am, after the Saturday filled with taking the train to the City and spending the better part of the day foraging the best ingredients for my job at Seneca Center, elbowing through the amazing mix of locals and enthusiastic tourists at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market.  I love my job, I love the market and all the farmers and local producers that  I have built a relationship with over the years working in the food business....but.....I also really love the chance to relax on Sunday mornings with my sweet Husband and daughter, over a meal that I had to do absolutely nothing for, except drag my hiney out of bed!

Berkeley is an amazing town.  Full of wonderful opinionated folks, a well educated bunch, passionate about their place in society.  It is one of the many reasons that we sought to make this our home.  Certainly, one of the most enjoyable things about Berkeley (Oakland and SF too for that matter!) is the availability of local, sustainably produced food and the hardworking folks that bring it to us everyday.  I am so grateful that on Sundays, I am not one of those people, but a benefactor.  

So on Sunday am we get up and without much thought as to where we will go, we head out the door to partake.  Sometimes I do a little internet research ahead of time, looking at reviews from other folk and Michael Bauer.  Sometimes I have a bee in my bonnet about places that I have had in que and wanted to try.  Most times, Troy and I have a brief discussion and we just go!  

Lucia sometimes has something to say about what she wants to eat, but if we gave her a choice about where to go...she most certainly chooses Cafe Fanny.  Cafe Fanny is one of our old standbys.  The people are so wonderful, always greeting us by name and taking joy in seeing Lucia run around, petting doggies that come with their parents, and sipping on her big girl warm chocolate from a bowl.  Her she has two favorite breakfast selections at Cafe Fanny.  The warm and nutty steel cut oats, served with lovely melting butter and maple syrup. But most often, she chooses a soft boiled egg with Acme toast.  My go-getter, not afraid of anything daughter turns into a real little lady at Cafe Fanny, with her napkin on her lap and her tiny little egg spoon, daintily scooping warm, slightly runny egg from the light green shell.  She usually leaves her toast for last, eating it with cream cheese and their homemade jam. 

Troy and I really like a little and popular French place on Shattuck, I am sure that you will already know of it, it is one of the most popular places for breakfast, it is called La Note.  I always order the same thing.  Softly scrambled eggs with goat cheese and herbs.  It comes with a side of the most delicious oven roasted tomatoes and I suggest that you splurge and get the buttery, crusty croissant or the huge half a baguette instead of the toast.  Leave the butter that it comes with alone, and spread it with the lovely not too sweet raspberry jam that is a house specialty here.  Pure breakfast heaven!!  

We also really like 900 Grayson.  However, we dont get to go here as often as we would because they are not open on Sundays. We usually choose this tiny little heaven of slow food if we suddenly get a wild hair and go out on Saturday morning instead, but as I said before, my Saturdays are usually packed full with the market...so the opportunity does not happen often.  

We really like walking to Bette's on 4th Street. Consistently great food but sometimes the wait is just too much for hungry parents with a five year old.  I have a special place in my heart though for the folks at Bette's because my niece Brittany used to wait tables here.  

Meal Ticket, Cafe M and Leilas are all pretty good but for me uneven.  

Recently on a Sunday am when we decided to venture into the city for a meal, we took a chance and went to the really hipster, upscale Slow Club.  We had to wait more than an hour for a table, and had to really work to keep Lucia occupied for that huge amount of time (thank God for color books and washable pens!) but when we finally got to a table, we had an amazing meal. Lucia was happy with the oatmeal and I ordered a warm flat bread with wilted wild rocket, pecorino and a fried egg.  And...they serve Blue Bottle Coffee. Can you say YUM?  Fabulous is the best word that I can think of.  This place is on our short list for further ventures.

After our meal, we find a nice place to walk some of it off.  Coming prepared with LuLu's pink skitter helps to make it more fun for her, and we get a leisurely start to the end of our weekend. 

I love my job.  I love everything about it.  But I must say, at the end of a busy week being up at 5am, a wife, a mother, a chef and nutritional manager, a housekeeper, gardener, laundress and dog owner....I am most grateful on Sunday morning meals out with my family!