There are 4 stages of bagel baking: Making the sponge, making the dough, shaping the dough, and boiling/baking the bagels. This recipe takes 2 days total, so lets get into it.

Recipe – Sourdough Bagels

Ingredients needed for a dozen bagels:

• 600g Sourdough Starter
• 220g Bread Flour for the sponge + 2-3 cups for dough
• 290g Water
• 1 TBSP Salt
• 1 TBSP Brown Sugar
• 1 TBSP Baking Soda
• 1 Egg

Making the Bagel Sponge

Combine the following ingredients in a large mixing bowl:

• 600g Stiff Sourdough Starter
• 220g Bread Flour
• 290g Water

This will be a very wet mixture! Mega hydration.

Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, and let it rest for 4-6 hours. It should have a bubbly fermented top when it is ready.

Making the Bagel Dough

Combine the following ingredients into the Sponge mixture:

• 2-3 cups of Bread Flour
• 1 TBSP Salt
• 1 TBSP Brown Sugar

I usually just add 2 cups of flour to start. If you add too much flour, I find it is hard to form the bagel shapes later. I like my dough to have a slight tackiness at the end of the kneading process.

I knead the dough for at least 5 minutes, until the dough is smooth. I use my Kitchenaid to mix the dough, but I don’t let it do the kneading. This dough is too dense and can break the motor in the Kitchenaid, they are not made for that dense of dough.

I let my finished dough rise, unshaped, at room temp in a large bowl, for 3-6 hours. Ideally it can double in size, but beware it rises a lot!

Shaping the Bagels

There are 2 good ways to shape the bagels, I personally prefer the roll it out method. Hailey prefers the hole in the middle method.

Here are Youtube videos that show you the 2 methods, it really just comes down to preference:

After the bagels are shaped, I put them on an oiled sheet pan (or a plate) and then I spray more olive oil over top so they don’t stick. I put some more plastic wrap over top, but make sure its not tight on the bagels, they rise more!

Then I put them in the fridge over night – or at least 8 hours.

Boiling and Baking the Bagels

Preheat the oven to 500°. If you have an oven stoneware, make sure its in the oven or put a sheet pan in the oven the heat up. Having a crunchy bottom is very nice.

Bring a pot of water to boil with the 1 TBSP of baking soda inside the water. I also set out a non-shedding towel on the counter next to the oven. I also separate the egg to get just the egg whites. I mix the egg whites with some water and whisk them with a fork.

Once the water has boiled, pull the bagels out of the fridge. Boil the bagels for 1 minute total (they should float – but its not the end of the world if they don’t). Flip the bagels in the water after 30 seconds.

Place the bagels on the towel to cool down and finish boiling the rest of the bagels.

Next, brush the eggs with the egg wash we made! Add any toppings you want (ex: salt, everything seasoning, poppy seeds, etc.)

Bake the bagels on the preheated stoneware or sheet pan, for 10-20 minutes. This is dependent on how hot your oven runs/how crispy you want the crust.

Voila!

Now you have 12 sourdough bagels! Yay!

Tell me what you think of my recipe, and good luck baking.

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