The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

How to obtain this type if Blistering?

Boca Bagel Dude's picture
Boca Bagel Dude

How to obtain this type if Blistering?

First time here guys. I find this site super informative and thank you in advance for help to this question. 

 

I have been making bagels for about 6 months now and I'm finally getting a hang of the hand rolled, boiled and baked true method. I've been trying to recreate the bagels that I grew up on and I feel that I have archived it now.

So now I am trying to replicate some unique bagels that I found in NC. The picture I shared is of Big Dom's out Cary NC. Ive asked a few times if they use a wash or add something to the boil water to obtain the large blisters on their bagels. The only answer I get is proper fermentation. Well, I've fermented my bagels in all the ways possible and I still cant reproduce it. 

Can anyone shine some light on this for me?

Thanks, KP

dabrownman's picture
dabrownman

The bagel itself is baked pale but the huge blisters are burned.  These are walking dead, pustule bagels.   What you want is this instead.  Blistered well but not burned and the bagel is baked a golden brown.  Crystal crisp on the outside but chewy in the inside.

Boca Bagel Dude's picture
Boca Bagel Dude

Awesome response. Made me laugh. Thanks

Elsie_iu's picture
Elsie_iu

Well, the only times I get this type of "blisters" are when I under-knead low hydration dough. Intensive kneading and complete degassing is required to achieve a uniformly close and dense crumb. With bagel dough, large air bubbles are considered generally undesirable. 

If you really want to replicate these, you might try to avoid developing or degassing the dough too much. You can probably get these by frying the dough due to rapid expansion of gas.