Need some bagel advice.

[justhanginon]

I just made a batch of N.Y. water bagels (Peter Reinhart recipe) and they taste great but did not rise as high as I expected in the refrigerator rise. I suspect that the dough was not stiff enough and they ended up being really big in diameter but a little too flat. I am going to do the same recipe later in the week and make the dough stiffer but thought I would see if any bakers out there agree about the stiffness being the problem.

[Warpy]

1. Remember, the perfect bagel is best described as a cement donut

and less rise is better than more. You can try adding a little more flour to the recipe to encourage loft and control spread, but make sure you're not making an Einstein's bagel, a soft roll with a hole in the middle.

[TygrBright]

2. What Warpy sez!

Better a flattish bagel with that slightly fermented bagel-y taste and the proper chew in it, than a puffy bun with nothing to recommend it but bready, gluten-y texture.

A bagel without chew in it is pointless, you can buy them on the cheap just about anywhere.

An honest home-made bagel, OTOH, is beyond price.

hungrily,
Bright

[msanthrope]

3. Screw the loft. It's all in the skin. Did you get the skin right? nt

[justhanginon]

4. Thanks folks. The skin is fine but they are not

as chewy I would like. I will try additional flour. These are the first ones I've baked using diastatic malt so I may need to do some adjusting. We shall see. Part of the fun in cooking and baking I think.
You are right, they still taste really good with a shmear of cream cheese.

[SheilaT]

5. The first time I ever made bagels

and shared them at work, a co-worker took one bite and asked, "Am I supposed to eat this or play hockey with it?"

I'm crazed by the fact that (outside of a few places like NYC or Detroit) all I can ever find are what I call Bagels for Protestants. Don't get me wrong. Some of my best friends are Protestants, but their bagels leave a lot to be desired.

[Major Nikon]

6. It helps to understand a bit of the basics of breadmaking

Gluten is long protein strands that bind together and form the structure of your bread. Think of gluten as the steel girders of your dough. The more gluten you have and the more you stack those gluten strands against each other, the more the dough will tend to hold it's shape and rise upwards rather than outwards. More gluten development also makes for a chewy texture which is great for bagels, but terrible for cakes. That's why you use different flour for cakes and don't work it as much.

Assuming you are staying true to Reinhart's recipe, I suspect you aren't kneading the dough enough. Are you using a machine or doing it by hand?

[justhanginon]

7. Using a Kitchen Aid stand mixer and

kneaded for six minutes on medium speed. I used KA bread flour and saf yeast plus diastatic malt. After they rose overnight in the fridge I thought I might be in trouble because they just felt a little loose. I will make a stiffer dough next time. I make french bread all the time and I thought this was a stiffer dough than that but probably not enough. They taste fine but the inner texture is more like holey ciabata. Takes a lot of cream cheese to fill those holes
Thanks to all for for the advice.