28 Types Of Bagels, Explained

Bagels are the quintessential breakfast carb (sorry, English muffins). There are many untold truths about New York-style bagels, but the common history of the breakfast food can be traced back in time to 1300s Europe through its ancestor: the German pretzel. The bagel eventually went on to become a popular food for Jewish street vendors in Poland, where the bread was marketed toward the region's poor population. From there, the bagel moved to metropolitan New York City following swaths of European immigration in the late 1800s. 

Unlike other types of bread, bagels are poached in water before baking. The poaching process gelatinizes the crust, resulting in a crispy exterior and soft, pliable interior. The poaching liquid for bagels typically contains a malt powder, which adds color and a touch of sweetness to the bagel after it's baked. There are many toppings and variations on the traditional bagel recipe — all of which are full of novel flavors and textures. Here are some of the most popular bagel variations found in stores and restaurants across the United States. 

Everything bagels are our everything. These savory bagels are topped with a mixture of everything bagel seasoning, including garlic powder, onion powder, poppy seeds, sesame seeds, and sea salt. The everything bagel is the perfect snack for the indecisive folks out there because it contains toppings from some of the most common other bagel types. The everything bagel has furthered an obsession with everything seasoning on, well, almost everything — cantaloupe and everything bagel ice cream included. 

You'll find everything bagels are the popular base for cream cheese and lox (cured salmon) breakfast sandwiches. The saltiness of the lox and the addition of fresh dill and capers elevate this bagel to its fullest potential, bringing out the aromatics and merging with salty flavorings.

Sourdough bagels have a much more distinct flavor than other bagels due to the use of a naturally-leavened culture of yeast and bacteria. Like a sourdough type of bread, bagels use a sourdough starter for most of the leavening; some bakers may add a bit of commercial yeast to boost the rise and speed up the leavening reaction (via the Bread Guide). Sourdough bagels take a significantly longer time to rise than conventional bagels because the wild yeast and bacteria culture need time to digest the carbohydrates in the surrounding flour and emit the carbon dioxide that gives the bagel its rise. 

Sourdough bagels are topped with sweet or savory schmears and may include sprinkled toppings like everything seasoning, poppyseeds, or sesame seeds. The beauty of this bagel is what's inside, rather than the superficial dressings. 

Montreal bagels are a specific style of bagel with a wider hole than the New York bagel, which is a distant cousin. Along with this bigger gap, Montreals' feature the addition of a few flavor-enhancing ingredients: honey and eggs. These bagels are also shaped differently; bakers make long logs of dough before tying the ends together and rolling. The result is a thin, crunchy bagel with more exterior surface area.

After the bagels are boiled, the baker places the bagels into a wood-fired oven instead of a traditional New York bagel steam or convection oven. Montreal bagels are usually topped with savory breakfast toppings and flavored cream cheese — like salty lox and dill. 

Asiago bagels are cheesy, carby, bites of goodness, according to King Arthur Baking Company. The asiago bagel gets its distinct cheesy flair from cheese both inside the bread and baked on top of the bagel. Some asiago bagels, like those from Einstein Bros', contain multiple kinds of cheese besides asiago, including parmesan and romano. 

The asiago bagel is the perfect base for a breakfast sandwich. We recommend using it as the base for our bacon, egg, and cheese breakfast sandwich recipe. It features a unique bagel spread made from two unlikely yet commonly simple ingredients: butter and sriracha. You can cook your eggs in the spicy butter to add an additional layer of flavor, or melt the butter and spread it on your toasted bagel before adding the rest of your breakfast sandwich toppings. 

Poppyseed bagels are somewhat inconspicuous. According to Spice Advice, the poppy seed originated in the Mediterranean region and dispersed with the movement of people toward Europe. Many German, Slavic, and Jewish recipes use poppy seeds for a slightly nutty flavor on bread or in muffins, cake, or other batters. 

The poppyseed bagel is a nuanced bagel that pairs well with the sweet or the savory. However, there is one particular instance you should steer clear of these bagels: right before a drug test! According to information from Winchester Hospital, false positive test results frequently appear for individuals who consume poppyseed bagels before taking drug tests. Since different organizations have different thresholds for opium levels (the flower from which the poppy seed originates), there is no concrete answer for how many bagels you'd have to eat to fail a drug test. Instead, we recommend just having another bagel on this list. 

French toast bagels have risen in popularity with retailers like Panera Bread. Although it appears as though French toast bagels may be considered a fad that will pass in the coming years, the French toast bagel is actually one of the most flavorful types of bagels out there; you'll find delicious maple notes aside from cinnamon sugar. Typically, french toast bagels will have a cinnamon-sugar streusel on top as well as a sweet infusion in the dough. 

Although your first thought might be to combine the French toast bagel with a sweet or neutral spread, we'd recommend making a continental breakfast sandwich that covers all the bases. Maple-glaze is having a Reinassance moment regarding bacon pairings, so a crisped French toast bagel with eggs, cheese, and sweetened bacon is a sign of the times. 

According to SF Gate, whole wheat bagels and whole grain bagels are not synonymous. Many bagels marketed as "whole wheat" are usually made with white flour along with the bran of the grain, while whole grain bagels contain the endosperm, the bran, and the germ. The bran in a whole wheat bagel provides more fiber than a standard white bagel, but not as much as a whole grain bagel. 

A whole wheat bagel tastes a little more true and nutty than a plain bagel, so it is a popular choice for folks seeking a more fibrous breakfast option. Pair a whole wheat bagel with a drizzle of honey for sweetness or plain cream cheese. 

Sprouted flours are not a different type of grain, rather, they are a grain harvested at a peak nutritional period. These grains have significantly more bioavailable nutrients than non-sprouted grains, as well as a plethora of vitamins A, B, and C, along with increased protein and magnesium (via Harvard School of Public Health). You can purchase sprouted bagel brands like Alvarado Street Bakery or Silver Hills at Whole Foods Market, Target, or other online retailers. 

Sprouted bagels taste similar to whole grain bagels, and you'll find the same hearty texture and nutty undertones. Pair sprouted grain bagel with your favorite avocado mash, a squishy burrata ball, or your favorite hot sauce. Like other bagels on our list, there's no wrong way to eat a sprouted bagel! 

The Riverfront Times said it best: "St. Louis' charade as a city on the rise has been exposed as a fraud by the revelation that Saint Louis Bread Company slices its bagels like bread loaves, in defiance of God's will and all that is decent." According to Mashable, a 2019 tweet with a photo of these bagels spread like wildfire on the internet, infuriating bagel aficionados and New Yorkers alike. 

Some, like Serious Eats, claim that cutting a bagel vertically into slices has more practical use than a single horizontal slice: sandwiching, hasselbacking, and croque monsieur-ing. Is this method an abomination? That's up to you to decide. 

Garlic bagels are a science that everyone seems to have a different idea of how to perfect. According to the Culinary Chronicles, you should add garlic powder to the bagel itself to impart a strong garlicky flavor. Adding garlic too prematurely can stunt yeast growth, though, so it is best to add the garlic after the bagel dough comes together, per The Practical Kitchen. Meanwhile, adding a fresh garlic and olive oil mixture after the bagels are almost fully cooked will prevent the garlic from burning and sliding off the bagel prematurely. 

You can top garlic bagels with a range of savory and crunchy toppings. Try filling lettuce in your breakfast sandwich for an added layer of crispness. If you're looking for a great flavor contrast to the garlic, we suggest spreading a thin layer of hummus on your bagel, adding a nutty and creamy mix that diversifies the flavor.

Even if you are gluten-intolerant, you still have to find a way to participate in the carb party! According to gluten-free health coach Rachael Roehmholdt, gluten-free bagels typically contain a combination of brown rice, sorghum, and buckwheat flour with either potato starch or tapioca starch. You can purchase a variety of gluten-free bagels from your grocery store, including brands like Against the Grain, O'Dough's, and Udi's. You can find some brands outside the gluten-free section with other frozen gluten-free baked goods. 

Gluten-free bagels are slightly more dense than gluten bagels but come in some of the same flavors as gluten-based varieties. Toast and schmear gluten-free bagels as you would regular bagels. When it comes to preparing these bagels, the best-recommended method is to go low and slow. Too high of a temperature can burn the outside while leaving the inside of your bagels woefully undercooked.

You're likely to find multi-grain bagels at your local Dunkin' franchise. The company makes its multi-grain bagels with sunflower seeds, flax seeds, millet, oats, wheat bran, barley, and sesame seeds. The multi-grain bagel has twice the amount of fiber as the Dunkin' plain bagel, so it is a better option for customers seeking a filling breakfast on the go. 

If you're looking for multi-grain bagels at home, we recommend trying Dave's Killer Bread Epic Everything Bagels. These delicious bagels are a hybrid between an everything bagel and a multi-grain bagel. You'll find the inside of this bagel brimming with sunflower seeds, flax, and chia, along with a delicious dose of garlic, onion, and poppy seeds on the exterior. 

Bagel twists are a concoction also popularized by the Dunkin' franchise, but this bake and boiled good has now made its way into home kitchens and bakeries alike. Although the bagel twist may appear difficult to make by hand, it is merely bagel dough twisted and topped with your choice of ingredients; cheddar cheese is one of the more popular bagel twist toppings, as the cheese helps bring everything together.

To form bagel twists, The Old Woman and the Sea recommends rolling out individual logs of dough. Pinch two of the logs together at the top and twist until intertwined. This forms the twisted shape and can be braided or include more than two dough logs for a more complex shape. 

A bialy resembles the same shape and flavors as a bagel. According to Food Republic, bialys, unlike bagels, are baked instead of boiled and baked. Because the bialy is not poached, it does not have the same shine or chew as a bagel. The inside of the bialy is puffy and bubbly, but these breads won't give you the same "pull" as a classic bagel. 

At first glance, you can tell the difference between a bagel and a bialy by the hole in the center (or lack thereof). Bialys are formed with a depression in the center, rather than a hole, per What's Cooking America. Bakers can fill this indentationed with poppy seeds, garlic, or onion. Bialys can be schmeared with cream cheese just like its bagel cousins or just eaten straight from the oven without any additional spread. Though texturally different, the flavor of a bialy will be roughly similar to a plain bagel and will depend most heavily on the quality of wheat used.