If you think you can't get a good bagel outside New York, think again. Some iteration of them have been around for hundreds of years, and now millions of Americans eat bagels for breakfast every day. It’s a food rooted in history, most likely starting in 15th century Poland, and in the US, it’s connected to Jewish culture, in part because “When European Jews began emigrating to the United States in the 19th century, bagels came along for the ride.”

With so much history behind it and variations since, it can be difficult to know what, exactly, constitutes a bagel. According to Ed Levine in Was Life Better When Bagels Were Smaller? it’s a round bread made with high-gluten flour, salt, water, yeast and malt. The dough is boiled and then baked, and the resulting colour should be a rich caramel with a slight cracking sound when you bite into it. Always made by hand, early bagels were smaller and denser than most today; when it was time to bake, they were put on redwood slats covered in burlap and placed in a stone or wood oven. 

Our version of a bagel doesn't stray too far from the American classic, and this tasty recipe from award-winning bread baker, author and Ooni Ambassador Bryan Ford (@artisanbryan) proves you can have it all from the comfort of your home. And with books such as “New World Sourdough” and “New World Baking: 150 Recipes from Central America, South America, Mexico, and the Caribbean” (out in 2024) he’s got an endless supply of knowledge and tips for novices and pros alike. 

For Bryan’s bagels, he adds his own twist by incorporating a levain – an offshoot of a mature sourdough starter – and whole wheat flour to help with the flavour profile, enhancing the taste and aroma. The dough is then shaped into rings and, before baking, briefly boiled in water with malt syrup for colour and a dash of sweetness (traditionally, malt was mixed in with all the other ingredients before rolling and shaping). Lastly, the bagels are covered in seeds and oven-baked until they develop a golden-brown colour – perfect for schmearing with your favourite spread or as a classic egg, bacon and cheese sandwich.

Before you know it, you’ll have yourself aromatic, crackly and seedy on the outside and chewy on the inside bagels that will cause envy and admiration. That doesn't mean they have to look perfect, of course: misshapen or not, they’ll still taste delicious. Making homemade bagels is also an opportunity to play around with toppings – lots of people are precious about what goes on a bagel, but we say do what tastes great to you.