How to make great bagels at home / ベーグルの作り方

I had a super rough bagel recipe just for myself ... ;) I improved the process over years baking hundreds of bagels and now I'm interested in writing down the recipe (thanks to a comment from @neumannsalva on Instagram).

長年適当に作っていたベーグルのレシピをきちんと残したいと思い、作りながらレシピを書き起こしてみました。茹でるプロセスが他のパンと比べてひとつ多いものの、材料少なめ、生地硬めで作りやすいパンです。慣れると家でもお店なみのができますよ！お試しあれ :)

So here is the recipe!

Ingredients (for 5 bagels)

Dough

• Bread baking flour (Type 550 in Germany) 300g
• Water 160g
• Sugar 20g
• Salt 4g
• Yeast 3g (6g if fresh)
• Optional: raisins 50g + cinnamon 1 tea spoon, seeds etc. Regularly it's said if we add dry ingredients such as dried fruits and seeds, they absorb water and dough gets dry. But as raising time of bagel is quite short, we don't really have to care this for baking bagels as long as the amount is modest.

Kettling (cooking in hot water)

• Honey or molasses 1tsp

Directions

1. Put all the ingredients in a bowl. If you put raisins or seeds, they should be added in the end of the kneading process otherwise they crush in the dough during kneading. Mix the ingredients for 7-8 minutes until the dough becomes smooth. If the dough is too strong for your mixer, kneading with a hand is an option.
   
   Add dried fruits and seeds really in the end of kneading
   
   (You can put cinnamon from the beginning. I just forgot it ...)

2. Keep the dough covered and let it rise for 10 minutes.
   

3. Cut the dough in 5 pieces. One piece becomes store bought bagel size. Keep each piece in a ball shape.
   

4. Form bagel shape. There are a lot of different technique to form the doughnut-ish shape. The most simple one is to make a hole in the center with a finger. Here is my favorite way. I took a video ... I have to practice video shoot ;)
   https://www.instagram.com/p/B-B92rlJXFs/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

5. Cover the dough with a tea towel and let it rise for 30-60 minutes (it takes longer in the winter time). This can be the most difficult part to figure out the best timing. To make it dense and chewy but not hard, it shouldn't be fluffy like other bread but it should rise some extent not as much as double the size. It increases the volume while cooking in water too so don't worry if it isn't super fluffy.
   In the last 15 minutes, prepare hot water with honey in a pan and start preheating oven to 200 degrees.
   <I must take and add here before/after photos next time I bake bagels ...>

6. Let's cook bagels in hot water. Be sure oven is preheated. Bagels have to go right away after being cooked. Cook each side for one minutes (Front side up 1min -> Back side up 1 min -> Front side up quickly) and quickly slide bagels to the tray.
   

7. Bake for 20-22 minutes.

8. Cool down on a cooling rack.

Bonappetito!

Here is my favorite bagel baking video :)