Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, everyone! I can't believe it's been 2 months since I've posted. Never fear, I've been cooking and baking as much as usual. The crush of the holidays left me with less time to post, and there were many times I was so distracted that I forgot to photograph what I'd made. I do have a few things that I managed to catch, so I will be posting those soon.

One of my favorite gifts, courtesy of my sisters, was a copy of The Bread Baker's Apprentice, along with a supply of instant yeast and specialty flours and cocoa. I can't wait to try out the recipes, and if you are interested in making your own bread (and learning the basic philosophy of bread baking), I'd highly recommend this book.

Here are some New York-style bagels from the book that my sister and I made recently. While not quite as good as what you can buy in NYC, they are close and certainly better than most of what can be found in the D.C. area. I just need to work on my shaping. :)

More to come!