This year on the Great British Bake Off we saw Rainbow Bagels be the technical challenge in bread week.
Whether the bagels were rainbow coloured or not, if only the bakers understood the principles of the bagel they would have all cracked it. SMASHED it in fact! But even despite their various faults they were all declaired as nice tasting bread and that, I believe, is a great lesson for us all.
This is and has been my go-to bagel recipe for a long time! And I’ve included some tips and principles along the way to help you get them just right, have fun.
Jack :-)
Classic Bagels
Notes
This recipe will make 6 Bagels. They are boiled before they are baked so you’ll need a large saucepan and a spider or slotted spoon to lift them from the water.
Difficulty: Easy to make, easy to bake
My Kitchen Temperature: 21°C/70°F
Start to finish: 3-3.5 hours
Ingredients
For the dough:
210g Room temperature water
5g Fresh yeast or 3g dry yeast
375g Strong white bread flour
5g Salt
10g Olive Oil
For shaping, baking and finishing:
Olive or vegetable oil
1tbsp Bicarbonate of soda
Sesame seeds, poppy seeds, sea salt flakes
Method
Making the Dough
In a large mixing bowl weigh your yeast, add the water and mix together until the yeast is dissolved.
Next add the flour, salt and olive oil.
Mix everything with your dough scraper until it comes together into a rough dough and then turn it out onto a clean table. The dough will be quite dry here, and might be tighter than you are expecting. Knead your dough well for 8 minutes without dusting with any flour. Then, shape it into a ball and place it back into the bowl. Sprinkle the top with a little flour, cover with a clean cloth and rest at room temperature for 90 minutes.
Dividing and Pre-shaping
Dust the top of your dough and use your dough scraper to turn it out onto the table. Make sure the dough comes out of the bowl upside down, sticky side up.
Use your fingertips lightly to flatten the dough and cut into six equal size triangles with your dough scraper, just like you would cut a cake. Line up your triangles in front of you so that the point is facing away from you.
Line a large baking tray with parchment paper and oil the paper lightly.
Shaping
One by one shape your bagels by rolling up into a sausage from the pointy end down to the curved edge. Pinch together the join to seal and then, with your palms, roll into a rope around 30cm long and taper the ends into a point.
Wrap your dough rope around your hand so that the pointed ends cross again in your palm. Squeeze those ends together, turn your hand palm down, and roll that part of the hoop on the table to seal the ends together.
Place your now shaped bagel onto your oiled tray and repeat with the rest, lining them up nicely.
Second Rest
Brush the tops of your bagels with a thin coating of oil and cover your bagels loosely with cligfilm of another upturned tray. Rest at room temperature and allow 45 minutes for them to puff up slightly.
This is the key moment for the bagel. The dough will rise slowly and that happens because we have used less yeast here than we would have done for rolls or a loaf for example, we don’t want the dough to double, far from it in fact. If the dough gets too puffy here it won’t hold up to the next stage which is boiling; the dough will be too delicate and will get all crinkly and might even collapse slightly!
This way we’ll get a little rise here, a little more in the water, and a final bit of puff in the oven and they will be just right.
While the bagels rest, preheat your oven to 200°C Fan/392°F/Gas Mark 7 with a deep tray on the bottom shelf. Boil a large pan of water and fill half a kettle of water too, ready to go for later on.
Boiling and baking
When you are ready to bake your loaves, boil the kettle and add the bicarbonate of soda to the boiling water in the pan.
Lift you bagels two by two (if your pan of water is big enough) and gently lower them into the water. Boil them for thirty seconds, turn them over for a further thirty seconds on the other side, and remove them from the water placing them back onto the tray where they came from with a spider or slotted spoon.
Repeat with the rest of the bagels and when they are all done sprinkle with your seeds and salt.
Place your tray of bagels in the oven and very carefully pour the hot water from the kettle into the tray below. Shut the oven door and Bake your bagels for 15-20 minutes.
Allow to cool completely on a wire rack.