You'd think bagels would be difficult, highly specialized. But in fact they're no more difficult to make than Dutch oven bread. Maybe easier. The dough, this one at least from North Carolina baker Bruce Ezzell (which I posted about years ago but wanted to do again in this baking during quarantine), is very stiff and easy to work with. And after mixing the dough only requires 10 minutes of resting and 10 to 15 minutes of resting after being shaped.
If you plan ahead by making the sponge the night before you want your bagels, you can have finished bagels in about the time it takes to make waffles.
The process is simple: mix equal parts water and flour and a little yeast. The next morning, add the remaining ingredients flour, salt, honey and malted barley syrup. Rest, portion and shape, rest. Poach them in alkaline water, then bake.
That's really all there is to it—they're fabulous and fun, with an almost crisp crust and chewy interior.
Bruce Ezzell's Bagels
Ingredients
Sponge
- 500 grams flour (3.5 cups)
- 500 grams water
- 3 grams active dry yeast (¾ teaspoon)
To Make Bagels
- 18 grams kosher salt (a tablespoon of Morton's coarse kosher salt)
- 18 grams honey
- 18 grams malt syrup (you can substitute molasses if you wish)
- 446 grams flour
- Baking soda (½ tablespoon for every 2 liters/1/2 gallon water)
- Poppy seeds, sesame seeds, coarse salt or other garnish recommended
Instructions
Sponge
- Combine the ingredients in the bowl of a standing mixer and mix with a spoon till the ingredients are combined. Cover and set aside at room temperature for at 4 to 14 hours. Do this before going to bed if you want fresh bagels in the morning.
To make bagels
- Add salt, honey, malt syrup, and flour to the sponge. Attach dough hooks to your mixer and mix at low speed for 8-10 minutes. This is a stiff, bucky dough so don’t walk away from the mixer if it has a tendency to walk across your counter top. I’ve had more than one mixer hit the floor and it is distressing. (This can also be mixed by hand.)
- Fill a deep pot filled with water on the stove to boil (measure the water so you know how much baking soda to use). When I boil I typically use a pan like a wok filled with water. Once the water comes to a simmer add the baking soda (1 tablespoon per gallon). Pre-heat your oven to 450 degrees.
- Once the dough is mixed remove it to your counter and cover with a cloth to let it rest for 5-10 minutes.
- Divide the dough into 12-13 (3-4 oz) pieces. Round each piece and set aside to rest for a few more minutes, covered.
- To shape take each ball of dough and flatten out slightly using the palm of the hand, making a disc approximately 3.5 inches wide. Make a hole in each using your thumb and place back on the counter, covered, to rise.
- After 10 minutes flip each bagel over so the bottom is now facing up. When this side begins to get slightly puffy and rounded it is time to boil. This may take as little as 5 minutes, but depending on the temperature of your kitchen, how cold your countertop is, etc., it might take longer. When the bagel looks and feels a bit puffy, it’s ready to boil.
- While your bagels are in their final rise bring your water to a simmer, then add the baking soda.
- Drop the bagels 3-4 at a time into the simmering water (depending on how large your pot is). They should float immediately or within a few seconds. Let them simmer for one minute, then flip them over using a chopstick or spoon and let the other side simmer for one minute. Remove from the water using a skimmer or large spoon. I like to bake them on a half-sheet pan lined with parchment paper. They can also be baked on a pizza stone.
- Sprinkle them with sesame, poppy seeds, salt or whatever you prefer immediately after removing them from the water, or alternately, brush with an egg wash and sprinkle after that.
- Bake for 12 to 13 minutes or until golden brown.
I've baked these several times since the first time you posted the recipe with great results. I usually boil the water bath instead of simmering and find it gives a better chew. I've also been meaning to try food grade lye in the water instead of baking soda but haven't gotten around to it yet.
Thanks for the report. I encourage you to try the lye. It's great for giving any bread a pretzel flavor. And in light amounts will keep the bagel a bagel.
RUHLMAN MADE ME A LYER!
I finally got a round to making a batch with Lye water. That was the missing piece! I went with 7g to 5678g of water (1.5 gallons) and might have just barely, barely stuck a toe across the pretzel line. Came out damn near perfect.
Just to keep my conscience clear, to anyone reading this and wanting to try Lye, make sure you understand the potential danger of working with Lye. Then do it.
great comment and glad it worked for you!
I have made thousands of bagels using this recipe and have yet to find a commercial bagel better. I modified the recipe to use malt powder rather than syrup.
Glad to hear it, thanks!
I switched from baking soda to sodium carbonate, which is a little safer at home than lye. It's easy to make from baking soda. Simply bake your baking soda at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for an hour. Sodium carbonate. A third cup to a gallon of water.
I'm weaker on the food science than I'd like to be. What does boiling in alkaline water do for the bagels?
changes the flavor and texture and makes them brown nicely. I don't know the exact science. try using a strong alkaline like lye and you have deep brown pretzels.
Please tell me you're baking in your pajama pants like the rest of us! (It looks like it in the picture of the sponge.) I've not made bagels before, have always wanted to try it; this has inspired me to do it, I'll let you know how they turn out.
of COARSE I'm baking in pajama pants!
Pants?
Nice! I feel so much better about myself LOL
I made these this morning and they came out pretty well. A tight structure but not too chewy. A nice touch of sweetness.
I need to try these, have tried a few others. What's different about this is no rise in the refrigerator. What's your thought about that? Optional, good to do, not necessary?
I've never tried fridge rise but always a good idea for flavor. that said this method worked well.
Most bagel recipes are mixed and shaped immediately, then given a long rise in the fridge to develop flavor. This reverses the process. The long rise is the sponge, because most home bakers don't have refrigerator real estate to devote to a tray of bagels. The sponge develops nice flavor.
I've tried a number of different recipes and this is my favorite, both in terms of flavor and effort. The lye is a little scary but it makes a huge difference in the taste.
The one problem I am still struggling with is my bagels collapse after they come out of the boil and don't rise very much in the oven. They taste great, but are flatter than I would like. This has been true with all the recipes I have tried so I'm sure it's something wrong with my technique.
I use hi gluten flour and boil for 1 min on each side. I have thought about trying to proof them in the fridge, like I've read elsewhere. Any other ideas?
Thanks.
i suspect you're overproofing them. think of the boil also as a kind of rapid proof stage.
If they are collapsing after the boil, they were over-proofed going into the water. Shorten your proofing time. I like to to refer to it as 'quarter-proofing'. As soon as the dough can float in the water, it's ready. If it sinks, it's not.
Excellent recipe goona try this for outdoor grill party
I ended up with way too much sourdough discard so used that as my sponge with the addition of the yeast and all I can say-- great. This is a great easy to follow recipe that on a cold early winter day smelled great, tasted great and looked good(need to improve my technique). Thanks Michael
yes, even if you're not using it for the yeast, it's great for the flavor.
Hey, Michael! Thanks for the mention again. It's much appreciated. Is there a link to the original post from all those years back? Couldn't find it here.
I've unpublished everything before 2012. reposted if you want to see it. https://ruhlman.com/bagel-recipe/
Probably have made this recipe 50 times, only burned up one KA mixer—it is a stiff dough! Boil with baked baking soda too. Made a batch this morning
And on another note Ratio is a go to reference book for me