Stir-Fried Bagels with Cabbage and Bacon

This recipe for stir-fried bagels with cabbage and bacon is so completely and unexpectedly delicious! 

This recipe for Stir-Fried Bagels with cabbage and bacon is an invention of the staff of Lejen Chen's bagel shop in Beijing. Entrepreneur Lejen Chen was born in Taiwan, raised in Brooklyn, and wanted a taste of New York when she moved to China. Her bagel shop is called Mrs. Shanen's Bagels.

One of her cooks, who was unfamiliar with bagels, decided to try a bagel by using it to replicate the Beijing street food caobing, which is a stir fry of cabbage, pork, and laobing, which is a type of Chinese scallion pancake. Evidently it was a big hit with the bagel shop's staff.

Who knew that you could stir fry bagels? Here's a wonderful story from the New York Times about Lejen Chen and bagels in Beijing.

Shopping list for stir-fried bagels with cabbage and bacon:

Bacon cut into 1/2 inch wide pieces

Ginger slices, smashed

Green cabbage (the regular kind, not Napa cabbage), cut into cubes

2 large plain or sesame bagels, fresh or stale, cut into 1/2 inch cubes

Specialty ingredients include soy sauce, rice vinegar, dried red chili peppers, and Sichuan peppercorns.

From your pantry, you will need peanut or vegetable oil, chopped garlic, and salt.

How to make stir-fried bagels with cabbage and bacon:

First, set up your mise en place. This is essential when stir-frying because the process is so fast. I also like to keep this digital timer nearby to time each step. 

Next, heat your wok, add the oil, the chili, the ginger, and peppercorns and stir for just 10 seconds! 

After that, add the bacon pieces and cook for about 3 minutes until some of the fat has rendered, and then add the garlic. Add the cabbage and stir-fry for a minute. Next, add the soy sauce, rice vinegar, and bagels.
Finally, cover the mixture and cook for about a minute, until the bagels soften just a bit. Add the salt, and stir-fry uncovered to just combine everything. 

Bottom line, I loved this stir fry. To me, this dish is a fresher version of bread stuffing. I'm not sure how to introduce it to dinner guests.... I am kind of fantasizing about bringing this stuffing to a Thanksgiving potluck. Wouldn't that be cool?

The original recipe calls for plain bagels. I had a couple of sesame seed bagels in the freezer, so I used those and they worked just fine. Personally, I prefer making stuffing with stale bread, so using stale bagels was perfect.

Just like bread stuffing, this dish made great leftovers too.

You can find this recipe on page 255 of Grace Young's award winning book, Stir Frying to the Sky's Edge (Simon & Schuster, 2010). If you are interested in authentic recipes from the Chinese diaspora, this book is excellent and the accompanying stories are fascinating. My copy is well loved and splattered with soy sauce and peanut oil.

You can also find the recipe on this site.

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More bagel recipes:

If you are now craving bagels, be sure to check out these bagels from scratch recipes, all Karen's Kitchen Stories tested. Any one of them would be pretty tasty in this stir fry:

• Onion Bagels

• Sourdough Bagels

• Jalapeño and Cheddar Bagels

• Asiago Cheese Bagels

• Classic New York Water Bagels

• Egg Bagels

This recipe has been updated with a new recipe card and photos. 

Stir-Fried Bagels with Cabbage and Bacon

I hope you try this recipe. Even better, I hope you buy the book. I pretty much learned how to stir fry from the book. I also learned how to care for a carbon steel wok, navigate an Asian grocery store, and even stir-fry a whole lobster. 

Stir-Fried Bagels with Cabbage and Bacon

Yield: 6 servings

Author: Karen Kerr

These stir-fried bagels with cabbage and bacon is so completely and unexpectedly delicious!

ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon rice vinegar
• 2 tablespoon neutral oil (peanut or vegetable)
• 1 dried red chili pepper, stem cut off
• 2 slices fresh ginger, smashed
• 1/2 teaspoon Sichuan peppercorns
• 5 slices bacon, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
• 1 tablespoon chopped garlic
• 6 cups (about 1 pound) cubed green cabbage
• 2 large stale bagels (plain or sesame seed), cut into 1/2 cubes
• 1 tablespoon water
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

instructions:

How to cook Stir-Fried Bagels with Cabbage and Bacon

1. Combine the soy sauce and vinegar in a small bowl. 
2. Heat your wok over medium high until a drop of water vaporizes within 2 seconds. 
3. Add the oil, the chili, ginger, and peppercorns, and stir for 10 seconds. 
4. Quickly add the bacon and reduce the heat to medium. Fry the bacon until it is slightly crispy, about 3 minutes. 
5. Add the garlic to the wok and stir for 10 seconds, and then add the cabbage. 
6. Increase the heat to medium high and stir fry for about a minute. 
7. Add the soy sauce and vinegar mixture and then the bagels. Stir fry for one minute. Add the tablespoon of water, cover, reduce the heat to low, and cook for one more minute. 
8. Remove the cover and sprinkle the mixture with the salt and stir one more time. 
9. Serve immediately. 

Calories
253.63

Fat (grams)
8.85

Sat. Fat (grams)
1.64

Carbs (grams)
34.98

Fiber (grams)
3.99

Net carbs
30.98

Sugar (grams)
8.21

Protein (grams)
10.40

Sodium (milligrams)
682.51

Cholesterol (grams)
9.49

https://www.karenskitchenstories.com/2016/03/stir-fried-bagels-with-cabbage-and.html

Karen's Kitchen Stories

stir-fry, cabbage, bagels

Stir-fry, side dish

Chinese, Jewish

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