Bialys!

Charlotte had asked what a bialy was. Well, this looks like, feels like, and smells like a bialy. It's not cool enough yet to see if it tastes like a bialy, but I'm cautiously optimistic.

Baking these added another foodstuff to Cookie's bad list. She hates it when the smoke detector goes off, and since the detector lives in the tiny L-shaped hallway outside the bedrooms of my tiny house, any excess carbonization can set it off. Cookie goes off many minutes sooner, no matter what's cooking. (Pavlov's dogs have nothing on her, you betcha!)

OK then, bialys rise with heavily floured towels draped over them (handwoven linen in my house, thank you very much :), and they rest and bake on heavily floured cookie sheets. Once I put the bialys in the oven, I put the floured linen towels into a water-filled basin and set that into the bathtub to soak and rinse out the flour.

Bad moves! In a 450F oven, the flour on the cookie sheets toasted and eventually set off the smoke detector. When Cookie goes into freakazoid "I smell smoke" mode - well before the siren goes off, mind you - she jumps into the bathtub, which today meant jumping straight into the basin of linen towels and water. She then jumped out and trailed large puddles of water all over the house. (Remember that she's a very furry Keeshond and can absorb lots of water!)

Argh! I let her out to pee before she had an accident and then put her in her crate for the duration of the baking, while leaving a fan in the hallway to dissipate the smell of burnt flour.

Moral of the story: next time I  bake these, I'll put Cookie into her crate before the bialys go into the oven. Otherwise I'll need to win the lottery to buy a house with a completely separate kitchen!

Comments

[Maus]

LOL, nice story :) Great dog, you don't NEED the smoke detector, you have one right living with you then.
We once had one in a New jersey house that set off each time somebody made toast or scrambled eggs, very annoying. Made me wonder if it would have really gone off with a fire in the house.
Isn't there something eternally satisfying about handwoven dish towels? I just love it each time I dry my hands in the kitchen!!

[Steven Bobker]

It looks absolutely delicious (send a dozen, please, put it on my tab), but not like I remember. It's taken days, but I finally realize what's different: the perfection of the rise. The deli bialys of my past were sort of uneven all over the top with ups and downs. I don't know if that was a result of travel or something else. The onions look darker than I remember but that's probably just taste and local variation. Overall, an A on looks. Taste TBD .