 The
bagel (or sometimes beigel, in Poland also bajgiel, bajgel, precel,
obwarzanek) is a food traditionally made of yeasted wheat dough in
the form of a roughly hand-sized ring which is boiled and then
baked. The result is a dense, chewy, doughy interior with a browned
and sometimes crisp exterior.
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Bagel Recipes
It often features seeds, such as poppy or sesame, baked on the outer
crust. Other flavor varieties include: salt, onion, garlic, egg,
pumpernickel, cinnamon-raisin, "everything", cheese, caraway, whole
wheat, multigrain, blueberry, muesli and others.
A related bread product is a bialy, which has no hole, is often
onion or garlic-flavored, and is less crispy on the outside. A key
ingredient is it's high-gluten flour.
Though often made with sugar, malt syrup or honey, bagels should
never be confused with doughnuts (donuts).
New York, Montreal and Quebec City are North America's bagel
capitals.
Bagel care
The ideal way to eat a bagel is
fresh out of the oven from a reputable and friend-recommended bagel
shop.
Refrigerator Storage: If your bagel is not eaten while exiting your
favorite bagel shop, let it cool in a paper bag. To keep bagels 5-7
days, they should be stored in a carefully closed paper bag, then
wrapped tightly in a plastic bag, and placed in the fridge.
Proper Revival Method: To properly revive a refrigerated bagel to
near fresh-baked status, remove bagel from the fridge, slice in two
and lightly moisten, or 'banetz' (Yiddish term for 'moisten')
surfaces with a small amount of cold water. Toast or bake the bagel
until hot throughout and slightly crispy on surfaces. Keep bagels
away from microwave ovens as these machines are not a proper means
of reheating bagels.
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Freezing: Bagels can be frozen quite reliably. Remove air from
freezer-bag of room-temperature bagels, freeze. To thaw, moisten
lightly banetz (see above) with cool water and bake in toaster-oven
or stove. Once half-baked you may cut open then toast to perfection.
You may freeze bagels pre-cut to save a step. Bagels that are frozen
are good up to six months.
The bagel's history
The bagel originated in Central
Europe, probably in Poland. A 1610 document from Krakow mentions "beygls"
given as a gift to women in childbirth. This is often cited as the
earliest known reference to the bagel, but the document is not clear
what a "beygl" is; it may be what is now known as a bagel, it may be
something related to the word for stirrup "beugal", or something
else the meaning of which is lost to history.
Bagel slicerAn often repeated story says that the bagel originated
in 1683, when a baker from Vienna created them as a gift to King Jan
Sobieski of Poland to commemorate the King's victory over the Turks
that year. The baked good was fashioned in the form of a stirrup to
commemorate the victorious cavalry charge. That the name bagel
originated from "beugal" (stirrup) is considered plausible by many
both from the similarities of the word and due to the fact that
traditional handmade bagels are not perfectly circular but rather
slightly stirrup shaped. More prosaically, the name may simply
originate from the Yiddish word "bugel" or the German word "bugel",
meaning a round loaf of bread (see Gugelhupf for a German cake with
a similar ring shape).
Immigrants in the 1880s brought the bagel to New York City, where it
continues to flourish. Until the 1920s it was rare in other parts of
the United States other than a few cities with large Eastern
European Jewish communities. The bagel came into much more general
use throughout North America in the last quarter of the 20th
century. Specialized devices have even been invented to allow for
easy slicing of bagels without "squishing" them (a perceived
"danger" when using a knife and hand).
Bagel types
The two most prominent styles of
traditional bagel in North America are the Montreal bagel and the
New York bagel. The Montreal bagel contains malt and egg and no
salt; it is boiled in honey-sweetened water before baking in a wood
oven; and it is predominantly either of the noir/"black seed"
(poppy) or blanc/"white seed" (sesame seed) variety. The New York
bagel contains salt and malt, is available in a wider variety of
flavors (though Montreal's oldest bagel institution is quickly
catching up), and is also boiled prior to baking in a standard oven.
The resulting New York bagel is puffy with a noticeable crust, while
the celebrated Montreal bagel is smaller (though with a larger hole)
chewier, sweeter and even less like a frozen supermarket-variety
"roll-with-a-hole" than the New York bagel is.
In addition to the plain bagel, there are variants with seasoning on
the outside, including sesame, garlic, poppy seed, onion, rye and
the "everything" bagel, a mixture of all of the above. Other
versions which change the dough recipe include cinnamon, raisin,
pumpernickel, egg and sourdough. In New York City green bagels made
with food coloring are sometimes created for St. Patrick's Day. In
Montreal, places that sell "New York-style" bagels rarely become
popular with the local populace.
In the late 20th century, many variations on the bagel flourished,
including those made with different types of doughs, and with new
non-traditional foods and seasonings added to the dough. Breakfast
bagels, a rather softer, sweeter variety usually sold in fruity or
sweet flavors (cherry, strawberry, blueberry, cinnamon-raisin,
chocolate chip, ...) are commonly sold by large supermarket chains;
these are usually sold pre-sliced and are intended to be prepared in
a toaster and often are served with jam (though they may also be
eaten with the more traditional cream cheese as well, especially
fruit-flavoured cream cheese). More traditionally flavoured bagels
(e.g., plain, or onion) are commonly used to make sandwiches with
egg, cheese, ham, and other popular breakfast foods.
A recent addition to New York City bagel stores are "flagels," a
flat bagel sprinkled with usual bagel toppings, favored by low-carb
dieters.
Bagel chips are a snack food variant on the bagel.
The bagel around the world
In Russia, the bublik has become so
mainstream that most Russians aren't aware that it was originally a
Jewish bread.
The Uighurs of Xinjiang, China enjoy a form of bagel known as girde
nan, which is one of several types of nan, the bread eaten in
Xinjiang (Allen, March 1996, p. 36-37). It is uncertain if the
Uighur version of the bagel was developed independently of Europe or
was the actual origin of the bagels that appeared in Central Europe.
In Turkey, though narrower and larger, simit is very similar to
sesame seed bagels.
Bagel sandwiches
The bagel sandwich, where a sliced
bagel substitutes for the two slices of bread, has become common
nowadays, although the bagel sandwich with cream cheese, lox, tomato
and onion had already been a tradition among Jews for some time.
McDonald's created a line of bagel sandwiches for their breakfast
menu, but have recently scaled back the varieties available;
however, key ingredients are some form of egg/cheese/meat
combination, sandwiched between the bagel slices.
Another interesting and popular bagel dish is the pizza bagel. The
bagel is sliced, topped with tomato sauce and cheese and then
toasted or re-baked. It is an ideal toaster oven food.
Sliced bagels are often (and best) toasted. Spreads may include:
cream cheese, butter, peanut butter, jam, marmalade, apple butter,
maple butter and more. |
