Vibrant Azerbaijani Rainbow Bagels with Sweet Cream and Fruit

These hand-twisted, naturally dyed bagels offer a delightful chewy texture paired with a variety of rich cream, fresh fruit, and poppy seed fillings for an authentic rustic treat.

Servings 12 bagels Difficulty Medium baking bread butter cheese dairy fruit sweets 2 hours

Products used in this recipe

Important Disclaimer: The original video shows large-scale traditional cooking without precise measurements. The quantities below are estimations adapted for a smaller, home-friendly batch and might need adjustment. They are inspired by the video but are not exact conversions. Feel free to adjust ingredients like sugar or ghee to your personal preference.

Ingredients

📌 Ingredients for Traditional Azerbaijani Rainbow Bagels You Can Make Yourself:

For the Dough:

🍞 1 kg All-purpose flour
🍞 10 g Dry yeast
🥛 200 ml Warm milk
🥛 50 g Melted butter
🥚 2 Eggs
🥕 100 g Pumpkin puree (for Orange color)
🌿 100 ml Spinach juice (for Green color)
🍓 100 ml Beetroot juice (for Pink color)

For the Fillings:

🧀 400 g Farmer's cheese or Cream cheese
🥛 100 ml Honey
🥛 50 g Powdered sugar
🍓 200 g Fresh strawberries
🍓 200 g Ground poppy seeds
🍓 100 g Chocolate chips
🍓 50 ml Milk
🍐 2 Pears
🍐 100 g Sugar (for pear syrup)
🍌 2 Bananas

Instructions

👩🏻‍🍳 Preparation Steps for Traditional Azerbaijani Rainbow Bagels:

1. Prepare three separate dough bases by dividing the flour, yeast, warm milk, eggs, and melted butter into three bowls.
2. Incorporate the pumpkin puree into the first bowl for orange, the spinach juice into the second for green, and the beetroot juice into the third for pink.
3. Knead each dough separately until smooth and elastic, then cover and let rise in a warm place for approximately 1 hour or until doubled in size.
4. Once risen, punch down the doughs and divide each colored batch into 12 equal portions.
5. Roll a small piece of each color into a flat disc, stack the three colors on top of each other, cut into strips, and twist them tightly together to create a multi-colored rope.
6. Shape the twisted ropes into rings, sealing the ends firmly to form the bagel shape, and let them rest for 20 minutes.
7. Bring a large pot of water to a gentle boil and carefully drop the bagels in, boiling for 1 minute on each side until they float.
8. Transfer the boiled bagels to a baking tray lined with parchment paper and bake in a preheated oven at 180°C for 20-25 minutes.
9. While the bagels bake, prepare the sweet pear filling by slicing the pears and simmering them in a pan with sugar and a splash of water until they become translucent and syrupy.
10. Create the cream filling by whisking the farmer's cheese with honey and powdered sugar until light and fluffy.
11. Prepare the dark poppy seed filling by heating the ground poppy seeds with milk and stirring in chocolate chips until a thick, spreadable paste forms.
12. Slice the cooled rainbow bagels horizontally and assemble with generous layers of the prepared sweet cream, poppy seed paste, fresh strawberries, bananas, and the syrupy pears.

Watch the recipe video