By Marie-Antoinette Issa.
Australia’s love affair with bagels is in full swing - but, how can you tell if that chewy, round delight on your plate is the real deal…or just a ‘roll with a hole’?
According to Brooklyn-born food journalist Michael Shafran - founder of Sydney’s beloved Brooklyn Boy Bagels (BBB) - which last year claimed the title of Best Bagels in Asia Pacific - there’s a world of difference between authentic New York-style bagels and the imposters - it all starts with how they’re made.
"I’m a native New Yorker and a Jewish one at that, so having great bagels was just a normal part of my birthright,” says Michael. "Dad played tennis early on Sunday mornings and then came back with fresh bagels, cream cheese, lox, pickled herring, white fish and more from the local bagel shop.
"Breaking the fast on Yom Kippur? Bagels. A morning-after wedding party? Bagels. Sitting shiva for a funeral? Plenty of bagels.”
When he moved to Sydney in 2001, Michael found himself craving those familiar flavours but, this search for a good bagel left him cold.
"My expectations were low. What I found was even lower. So, I taught myself how to make bagels at home and tested them on my friends for 12 years before I launched Brooklyn Boy Bagels.”
What exactly makes a bagel the ‘missing carb’ in Australia’s cafe scene?
"A bagel might be carbs, but it’s unlike any bread. When made properly, it should be (but rarely is) a boiled product, only baked in an oven afterwards to get some colour and crisp. It is the polar opposite of sourdough,” he says.
"With sourdough, you’re trying to get extremely high hydration. Bagels, on the other hand, are quite low hydration and have a robust dough. I broke my KitchenAid gears three times trying to mix them at home.”
The difference, he explains, lies in the method - with boiling being non-negotiable. "There are other breads in the world with holes in them. What gives a bagel its personality is the boiling. It creates an interior chew and an exterior crust.
"Steaming sounds similar, but in reality, it only kisses the outside and doesn’t change the interior of the bagel very much. A kettle-boiled New York bagel is chewy, softly elastic and has a great mouthfeel.
"Steamed bagels are light and fluffy. New Yorkers call those ‘rolls with a hole’ and not in a good way.”
It’s this dedication to process, not shortcuts, that sets Brooklyn Boy Bagels apart. The BBB method is part science and part stubborn love. Michael uses a high-strength flour sourced from Provenance Flour & Malt, a single-estate farm in Australia to get the perfect texture.
"Most flour brands out there blend their wheat and only get about 14% wheat strength by adding extra gluten, often Chinese, to their bread. Ours gets up there naturally, due to being grown in one of the best areas in the country.”
From there, it’s a two-day affair: "To get very geeky [we start with]: autolysis > pre-ferments > bulk ferments > and the overnight cold proving. The next day, we boil, seed and bake our bagels. You can’t rush this stuff. Great artisan bread always needs time.”
That includes how you shape it. "Forming the bagel by rolling long, twisting it around your hand before you pinch it off,” Michael insists.
"I can’t tell you how many phony bagel-makers there are on YouTube and TikTok rolling balls and poking a hole with their finger through the centre. That ruins the texture and is a clear sign that someone doesn’t know what they’re doing.”
To ensure a bagel is worth its weight in salt (and sesame seeds) Michael also suggests focusing on texture.
"It should be chewy but soft, have a nice crust on the outside and it should have a great depth of flavour,” he says. "The latter comes from using quality ingredients and then giving the bagels a minimum of a day to prove and cold-ferment overnight.”
Don’t expect to find preservatives or artificial flavours in a BBB bagel either. "The ones from my cafe are all-natural, made with love using an artisan process, baked fresh that day, all vegan (save for my jalapeno-and-cheese bagel), have zero preservatives and have no sugar in them (save for my cinnamon raisin and blueberry bagels).
"My blueberry bagels also use whole blueberries and don’t use purple-grey food dye or shellac them with sugar syrup like the mass-market guys do.”
So, what does not pass the bagel test? For starters, skimpy cream cheese. "The most classic mistake I see is spreading cream cheese like it’s butter. You should have at least 1 cm of cream cheese on there.”
Also: questionable flavour pairings. "I see people putting spring onion and garlic cream cheese onto their cinnamon raisin bagels…if I’m being honest, it tastes like a car crash.”
While Michael keeps it traditional, he admits he’s adapted for Aussie palates. Sometimes.
"I love spice, but I’m always toning down the heat levels for Aussies, who live near the bottom of the Scoville scale,” he laughs. "I did have challenges in the early years of getting Australians to enjoy classic bagels like pumpernickel or onion…but they have come around.”
Even Vegemite has snuck its way onto the BBB menu. "We’re in the business of making people happy and as long as we keep our bagels authentic, I’m comfortable playing with non-traditional flavours.”
Ultimately, Michael’s tips for bagel authenticity are simple.
"If it’s light and fluffy, it’s a shortcut. If it’s got a nice crust and a chew, it’s authentic. If the shape is perfectly round, a flat single shade of beige, the seeds are lightly scattered in a uniform way and there’s a too-big, symmetric circle for a hole, it’s mass-manufactured.
"If there are darker-lighter colour variations, fermentation blisters on the dough, tons of seeds on top and the holes vary a lot and are oval and tight, it’s probably authentic, he says. "Remember, if you see too many ingredients that cover up the taste of the bagel, they might just be hiding something.”
