Pizza Bagels

So, this is not really a recipe. I mean there is a real recipe here… for the bagels, but it is not my recipe, so I can’t put it here, but I can send you to it. The bagel recipe I used can be found at Epicurious. For the record, I used honey because I couldn’t find barley malt syrup. You should try it. And, now that I have, I am definitely going to be coming up with my own variations. But, back to the pizza bagels. This is really just assembly after you make the bagels, but it got rave reviews from all the kids AND the adults.

Let me give you some information about feeding kids at our house. We frequently have my young adult children and Steve’s seven and nine year old grandsons for dinner. I will go in age order just to be fair. First up is my daughter who is basically carnivoristic (apparently not a word). She also has really bad food allergies (like, life threatening) and due to being allergic to most processed foods as a child, never acquired a taste for them. Next, up is my son. He is a vegetarian. He, of course, grew up with his sister and never acquired a taste for processed either. That right there would be difficult. I mean there isn’t much crossover with a carnivore and a vegetarian. Then, enter the grandsons. The oldest wants typical kid food preferably out of box. He thinks homemade is bad. So, that takes out the whole unprocessed thing, so at this point, we have ruled out vegetable, meat, and both processed and unprocessed. I’m sure you are starting to get the picture. Then there is the youngest. He has a broader palate as long as it isn’t hot or spicy, but wants what he has in mind, not what you have in mind, and with all of those already established rules, you can bet what he has in mind isn’t on the list of the other three. So, what will they all eat? Cheese and bread = PIZZA. The bagels were a risk because they are homemade, but add a little sauce from a jar (also a risk because it is not homemade), and it works. Somehow, it seemed to hit everyone just right. Everyone thought it was a fabulous idea. I think this is the first time they all agreed! We had homemade bagels with jarred sauce and both veggies and meat to choose from as toppings. It was the perfect meal for this group!

Now about the bagels, you can buy your own or make them, but here are some photos of our process.

The risen dough…

and the bagels rising…

and the bagels boiling…

and topped and ready to go into the oven… Note that the bagels were already baked at this point. Now, we just needed to heat up the pizza toppings and make sure the cheese was good and melty.