Halleluyah! That’s all I have to say about that.
As you know, Germany has an abundance of fresh baked bready items, but I have yet to find anything resembling a bagel. Oh how we have missed warm, toasty bagels with melty cream cheese slathered on top. So, being the resourceful (and food loving) girl that I am, I decided to try my hand at bagel making. And it worked! Very well!
It was much easier than I imagined, and don’t let the boiling part scare you. This is totally worth the effort, especially if you have…hmmm…say a fancy schmancy cappuccino to go with it.
I found the recipe here on Tasty Kitchen, and it made four bagels. After making the dough and letting it rise for 25 minutes, I made four ropes and turned those into circles. As you can see, they have pretty large holes in the middle, but that’s because you have to let them rise again.
I think you only need to let them rise another 20-30 minutes, but we took advantage of the fact that the rain had stopped and went for a walk into town. When we got back, an hour and a half or so later, they were looking much more bagel-ey.
Then I just boiled them in a pan for a minute on each side. The tricky part was flipping them. Maybe next time I will use a deeper pot, but I was worried they would get stuck together if it wasn’t wide enough.
After boiling them, I baked them for 18 minutes at 200 C, flipping them over half way through.
I am SO PROUD! Can you tell from my big smile? Luckily they tasted as good as they looked. Milo’s very words were “Mmm, these are really good!” I think he was skeptical about my bagel making, but in the end it worked out great! 
OK! You are amazing! What a baker. Now about the cream cheese: same as the US variety? Love all the photos to show the steps.
Yes, there is a large variety of “Philadelphia” as it is known here, although considering the lack of bagels, I am not sure exactly what people do with it (I guess just spread it on bread?). I want to try making my own cream cheese…I think it is also not too hard, just need to get some cultures and a yogurt incubator. That will wait until late summer I think.
I love lachs! The only time we buy top quality raw fish is when we make sushi, but sounds like making lachs would also be fun! I think you can make a variety of bagels with this recipe – add a bit of whole wheat flour for a “healthier” verision, or some cinnamon and raisins, or sun-dried tomatoes. YUM! You guys should definitely give it a try!