baking day

After reading this lovely post at bluebirdbaby, I tackled my own daily rhythm once again, with the intention of structuring the week to have recognizable days for Ari to take part in, such as baking day or painting day or friend-play day. I will keep our existing rhythms, which are pretty strong; we always eat breakfast together before Perry heads off to work, Ari always has free play time in the morning while I do food prep for the day, we go out for a walk every day before lunch. But I love the idea of having an activity that grounds each day and makes it a little different from the next. As well, our week are currently structured so that we have two days out of the house (one day for playing with friends, and one day that Ari goes to my mom's while I work,) and three days home, so it makes sense to have those home days have a purpose and a title that he can understand. Of course, with a toddler's attention span, these activities will be pretty small and short, but they will all be things he enjoys and which we would do anyway.

So, we will give this a try- baking day, friend day, painting/art day, Baba (my mom) day, and wash day. I am most excited with trying out wash day- an idea that never occured to me before reading that post at bluebirdbaby! But it makes so much sense- he loves it when we hand him the child-sized broom, or ask him to wipe up a spill. I just have to gather enough of my own patience to get through mopping the floor with a toddler's "help!"

Ari really thrives with the daily rhythms, often reminding us of things we are forgetting- singing the "going outside" song for us if we are getting ready without singing it, holding out his hands for the meal blessing if it looks like we might start eating without it.

So this week on "baking day" we tried making bagels. I'd always wanted to make them, and came across a simple recipe in "The Well Fed Baby" that seemed like something we could do together.
Ari loved the whole process, the stirring, the kneading, covering up the dough for a "nap" (rising,) shaping (his were a little more like pancakes...) and watching mama drop the dough into the bubbling water. He mostly wanted to eat the seeds, but once the bagels were cooking he was pretty excited to watch them through the oven window, and was happy to try them when they emerged.
...with lots of butter of course. And then again at dinner, because that is what we served up: bagel sandwiches with lots of fixin's.
And here's the recipe for anyone else who might want to give it a go. They turned out chewy and delicious, much better than I expected for our first baking day project.

Chef Rachel's Bagels

4 tsp active dry yeast
41/4 to 4 1/2 cups flour ( I used a mixture of unbleached and barley)
1 1/2 cups lukewarm water
1/4 cup sugar + 1tbs
1tbs salt

In a large mixing bowl combine yeast and 3/4 cups of the flour.
Combine water, 1/4 cup sugar and salt. Add to yeast mixture and mix with beaters for 3o seconds on low and then 3 minutes on high.
Stir in remaining flour to make a moderately stiff dough. Knead until smooth, 5-8 minutes. Cover with clean cloth and let nap for 20 minutes.
Fill a large pot with water and 1tbs sugar and bring to a boil. Preheat oven to 375F.
Take a small handful of dough and form it into a ball. Make a hole in the middle and smooth. Place 4-5 bagels into the simmering water at a time, stirring gently to prevent them sticking on the bottom. Let cook about 7 minutes, turning once. Remove from water with slotted spoon and dip carefully into toppings if you choose (seeds, finely chopped onions etc.) Place on cookie sheet and cook for 30-35 min until golden brown. Yum!

And thank you so much for all the sweet comments on the last post. We are pretty excited about a new babe joining our family and it is exciting to share the news!