Bagels

Ingredients

Dough
2 1/4 (1 packet) teaspoons yeast
2 cups (454g) water (warm to the touch, not hot)
1/4 cup (35g) malted milk powder
2 tablespoons (25g) sugar
1 tablespoon (14g) kosher salt
5 3/4 cups (690g) bread or AP flour

Water Bath
~3 quarts water
3 Tbsp baking soda
1 Tbsp molasses

Egg Wash
1 egg
1 Tbsp water

Topping Ideas
Asiago parmesan shaved cheese
Jarred jalapenos, blotted and sliced
Cheddar jack or other melting cheese
Everything but the Bagel seasoning

Gear

• Stand mixer (HIGHLY recommended)

• Kitchen scale (also highly recommended)

• Bench scraper

• Spider strainer (mine is silicone)

• Dutch oven or other large pot

• Cooling rack

• Kitchen brush

How to Make it

This is going to be a long one so stick with me! It'll be totally worth it, I promise.

Making the Dough

Start by combining the yeast and water with a pinch of sugar (no need to weigh, measure, or subtract from the recipe amount, it's negligible) in a mixing cup. Leave the yeast to bloom and add all dry dough ingredients to the bowl of a stand mixer. I like to use the weights because it's more consistent every time and I don't have to dirty lots of measuring cups, but it's up to you!

When the yeast/water mixture is foamy on top, add to the dry ingredients and slowly mix (setting 2 on the stand mixer) until it forms into a uniform ball, 2-3 minutes.

When the dough is in a ball and no longer sticking to the sides, turn the speed up to 6 and knead. For a long time. You can even turn it up to 8 if you're feeling bold! You'll want to knead until the dough passes the windowpane test, which means you can stretch the dough until it's so thin that you can see through it (see photo). Passing the windowpane test means the gluten has built up enough that you'll get deliciously chewy bagels. Usually my mixer starts to get warm towards the end, and keep an eye on it - they like to try to wander their way across the counter at this point. See why I said a stand mixer is highly recommended? This would be a lot of work to knead by hand.

Once the dough passes the windowpane test, let rise until doubled and it passes the poke test (lots of tests today). The poke test is when you can poke your finger about an inch into the dough, and when you remove it the impression remains and the dough doesn't try to close back up.

After the dough as doubled, add the water, baking soda and molasses to a large pot (I like my 5 quart dutch oven as it seems better at keeping a consistent temperature as you add bagels) and bring to a boil. We'll turn this down before you add the bagels, but it can take a while to get it to temperature so it's good to start it early.

Shaping the Bagels

Now it's the fun part! Well... aside from eating them. There are a couple different common ways to shape bagels, but I've found that this one consistently works the best for me.

Separate the dough into 12 equally sized pieces. I weigh mine to make sure they're even. Tf you're going that route, weigh the whole ball of dough and divide by 12, which should be right around 100g.

Now to start shaping. I've included photos of this process as well, but there are a number of good videos if you're still having trouble (if you want, let me know and I can try to put one on Instagram next time I make them!). To get started, lightly oil your working surface so you don't add extra flour. This will get gummy when you boil it.

Step 1
Lightly flatten the dough so it's about twice as wide as it is tall, 1/2"-3/4" thick and 4-5 inches wide.

Step 2
Fold the top third of your piece down to the bottom, then the bottom third up to the top. Lightly pinch the seam together, it should roughly be a cylinder at this stage.

Step 3
Roll out into a rope about 10" long and 1 1/2" thick. You want the rope to go all the way around your palm and have around an inch of overlap.

Step 4
Keeping your right hand on the right side of your rope, use your left hand to lightly wrap the rope around your hand, and the two ends overlap under your palm

Step 5
Roll the two ends together with your palm. This can take medium pressure, but be careful not to push too hard you will end up with a skinny spot on your bagel. Check to make sure the ends have mostly melded and aren't falling apart.

Step 6
Drop the bagel off of your hand and let the dough rest while you shape the rest of your bagels!

Set up for Boiling

To set up for boiling, you'll want your cooling rack laid out with paper towel underneath. This helps absorb some of the water that drips off of the bagels. It's also good to prep your toppings and pans before boiling as well.

Set out your baking sheets (you'll need 2), covered with parchment or foil and sprayed with oil. I use foil because it gives a crisper bottom, but that's personal preference.

For the toppings, scramble the egg with 1 Tbsp of water in a small bowl, and place near your baking sheets with your brush. Drain, blot and chop jalapeno if using, and shred cheese or remove bags of shredded cheese from the fridge.

Doing this prep now makes the rest of the steps easier!

Boiling

Bagels are boiled in an acidic solution prior to baking to create the crust. This is similar in process to pretzels, but the water for pretzels uses much more baking soda. The bagels will do most of their growth at this point, and just round out in the oven, so don't be surprised if they grow more than you expect!

Each bagel should be boiled for 45 seconds per side with the water at a bare boil - you should barely be able to see the bubbles. I usually leave my largest burner between 4 and 5 to achieve this.

To start, you'll want to assume the side of the bagel that is up while it's resting on the counter will be the top. Pick the bagel up and place it so the top is down in the boiling water. This allows you to use your strainer to flip the bagel without impacting the shape of the top.
I usually do two bagels at a time, and the 45 second time is approximate so you can add a second one now if you'd like. As you get comfortable making them, you can try shorter or longer boiling times to see what your preferred crust is.

Once the bagel has been in the water for 45 seconds (I use the stopwatch on my cell phone and try to keep running track of it some I'm not starting and stopping a timer constantly), take the spider strainer and lightly push on one edge of the bagel until it flips over. It shouldn't take much! If doing 2 bagels, repeat with second bagel.

Wait 45 more seconds and then, using your spider strainer, remove the first bagel from the water (it's now bottom side down) and transfer to your cooling rack to drain. Repeat to remove the second bagel.

Now you're ready to add the next two bagels! You'll need to repeat this process a total of 6 times.

Topping the Bagels

Once you have boiled and drained 6 bagels and they're waiting on your cooling rack, you're ready to top them. Transfer all six to a baking sheet and lightly egg wash. Avoid pooling the egg on the pan, this means you're egg washing too heavily.

After you have egg washed all the bagels, add your toppings. This is all about personal preference, but I'd advise to put on a bit more topping than you think you should, at least the first time.

Depending on personal preference, you can either put these 6 in the oven and continue boiling the rest, or you can leave this pan out and put both pans with all 12 in the oven at one time.

Baking

The bagels should be baked until they're a deep golden - much deeper than what you'll often buy at the store, which will help give them a better crust and flavor than if you only bake them to a paler gold. It should take 18-22 minutes, but try to keep an eye on them until to take them out when they're to your preference.

Let cool. Breads continue to bake after they're removed from the oven due to the steam trapped inside, so the texture will be much better if you wait.

And eat! I highly recommend cream cheese, capers, and cold smoked salmon for a weekend morning

The Deets

Yield: 12 tasty bagels
Oven: 425°
Bake time: 18-22 minutes or until golden brown - go darker than you think!
Notes:
Original recipe courtesy of King Arthur Bagels
I use all the same ingredients and amounts for the bagels themselves, but made a few other changes:

• Swapped out the malt powder in the boiling solution for molasses. It gives the outside of the bagels a gorgeous color and shine when baked

• Shaping: I use a complete different shaping method as I was never able to get mine to be anything but balls with their recommended method

• I use an egg wash before adding the toppings as it helps them to stick

• Flour does make a difference! Regular bread flour is roughly the same protein content (another post entirely) as King Arthur AP flour, so that's generally recommended. You can also use regular all purpose flour and get a great result, I just find that I get chewier bagels with bread flour