Veganmofo III: Day Fourteen, Brown

I submit my dinner for your disapproval. If the Powers-That-Be had wanted me to “eat my colors,” they would have made golden beets, mushrooms, onions, quinoa, Russian fingerling potatoes, and balsamic vinegar more diverse in hue. The beets and potatoes were roasted with a little spray of olive oil, kosher salt, and pepper. The portobellos and onions were sauteed with balsamic vinegar, and I paired them up with quinoa cooked in veggie broth.

And here are some pictures from yesterday’s bagel-making.

Unboiled lumps of bagel dough whose holes are quickly closing up. I’ll get the hang of it eventually.

Boiling the bagels before baking. This was the step that I was most concerned about and it turned out to be the easiest part.

Tray of bagels fresh out of the oven. It may not look like it, but there are faintly detectable holes in all of them in real life.

And a close-up. I used a recipe that Isa Chandra Moskowitz included in her post on “food migration” on the Powell’s Books blog. These are really delicious. They are almost all gone. I’ve never been to New York so I don’t know anything about genuine NY bagels, but the bagels I get around here are extremely dense. These bagels were considerably lighter, with all kinds of holes and nooks in them for catching extra toppings (jam, Smart Balance, and PB have all tested well so far). I just wish I had a stand mixer with a dough hook–kneading bagel dough by hand is an extremely sticky process.