In May, after years of development, we introduced Macrina’s Organic MadRy Sourdough Bagels to great acclaim. Now, to the four original flavors—Plain, Sesame, Poppy, Sea Salt—we’re adding the Everything Bagel. We coat our Everything Bagel, top and bottom, with a mix of white and black sesame seeds, blue poppy seeds, salt, fresh garlic and onion. Most producers use dehydrated onion and garlic flakes, but we were determined to use fresh ingredients.
“We had a tough time initially with the chopped garlic burning, but after much trial and error came up with a great result,” says Leslie Mackie, Macrina’s founder.
“The well-balanced taste of garlic and onion melds nicely and doesn’t overpower the flavor from the seeds and sourdough,” says Blake Gehringer, Macrina’s Production Manager.
Our MadRy Organic Sourdough Bagels are hand-rolled, given a slow, cool 24-hour ferment, and have just a hint of rye, which adds to their depth of flavor. The caramelized crust has a glossy sheen and the airy interior has a tight, springy crumb that balances the mild tang of sourdough with just enough malty sweetness.
All of our ingredients come from the PNW:
• The organic high-protein flour comes from just north of the border.
• The organic barley malt powder comes from Skagit Valley Malting.
• The organic rye flour comes from Fairhaven Mill in nearby Burlington.
We start with a significant percentage of organic sourdough starter and a smidge of yeast. After an initial rise, we handroll the bagels and give them a full day’s cool ferment. The depth of flavor you’ll taste in these bagels comes from the natural leavening and that hint of rye. The whiff of sourdough you get when you tear one open comes from the starter. We were careful not to let the flavor dominate but wanted it to be distinctive. “It should make sense when you taste the bagel that the name has sourdough in it,” says Scott France, Macrina’s President and Co-owner, and the driving force behind these bagels. “But if you tasted the bagel without knowing the name, someone intimately familiar with sourdoughs would recognize it, but if you didn’t, you might wonder just what that mild tang was.”
The bagels are available individually or as four-packs.