It seems that my previous post could have been a lot more substantial. Not only could/should I have included the recipes for all of the things mentioned, but I could/should have included information about how much money each one saves me. While for some things, this would be hard to figure out, I will do my best to provide recipes/instructions for most of the items, as well as an idea of how much money you can possibly save. So here's the first one!
BASIC BAGEL
The following recipe is for use in a
bread machine. I am sure you can make the same dough by hand, although I am
lazy and did not look up how to do it. I will therefore just give you the
ingredients and instructions as is and if you would like to make the dough by
hand (if you don't have a bread machine), then I'm sure it's pretty easy to
look that up.
A few things to note when using a
bread machine-add the liquids first, then the dry ingredients. Level the dry
ingredients, add the butter to the corners. Make an impression in the center of
the dry ingredients and add the yeast. Make another impression away from the
yeast and add the salt. The recipe should be baked on the setting for dough.
Ingredients for a 1.5 lb loaf
1 cup water, 80 degrees
3 cups bread flour
2 tbsp sugar
1.5 tsp salt
1.5 tbsp, cut into 6 pieces, butter
2 tsp active dry yeast OR 1.5 tsp
bread machine/fast rise yeast
After dough is formed and the
breadmaker shuts off, remove the dough from the bread pan and place into a
lightly greased bowl. Cover bowl and place in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.
After the dough is cooled, remove from the bowl and place on a lightly floured
surface. Roll the dough in a 1/2 inch thick rectangle. Divide the dough into 8
equal sections, roll each piece into a ball and punch a hole through the center
with your finger. Stretch the hole until it is about 1-2 inches in diameter.
Place formed bagels onto a greased cookie sheet about 2 inches apart. Brush
lightly with cold water, cover and set in a warm, draft free room to rise until
they have doubled in size (1-2 hours).
Bring 3 quarts of water to a boil in a
5 qt dutch oven. Add 1 tbsp of sugar and stir to dissolve. Reduce heat to low
and carefully add 2-3 bagels to hot water. Let simmer for 3-4 minutes on each
side. Remove with a slotted spoon, drain, then place on the greased baking
sheet about an inch apart. Sprinkle with garnish, if desired, and bake bagels
in a preheated 450 degrees oven for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown. Let
cool slightly before serving.
How Much Does This Save?
This is going to be a tough one to
figure out, since the ingredients are things that most people keep on hand
always and each item lasts for different amounts of time. I will tell you
however that the average price of bagels at my grocery store is $3.99 for 6
bagels. In those 6 bagels you also get things like high fructose corn syrup and
other additives, preservatives, dyes and fillers. To be fair, there are brands
out there that are a lot healthier and don't have these, but, they still cost
about $4-5.
So say just one person in your house
eats one bagel 6 days a week, that's $3.99 a week for bagels, so $15.96 a
month. If you only take into consideration just the three main
ingredients-flour, sugar and butter-here is the breakdown of the cost:
5lb bag of flour: $3.69
4lb bag of sugar: $3.89
4 sticks of butter: $3.49
Using these numbers, I figured out how
many of this bagel recipe you can make with each of these, then divided the
cost, getting the total cost for each of these items per recipe ($0.55 in
flour, $0.09 in sugar and $0.16 in butter per recipe). That means each recipe
costs $0.80, and each bagel costs $0.08 to make. So 6 homemade bagels cost
$0.60, meaning you can save $15.36 a month on bagels...and that's just if only
one person in your house eats bagels!
I will admit that this is one of the
more involved recipes and we don’t make it all the time, but they are so cheap
to make and can freeze well, too. I hope this at least shows you how a little
time can save a lot of money.
