Some of Sydney’s Best Bagels Are Cute Matcha Turtles and Coffee-Flavoured Cats

Yukiko Yamazaki is known as Bagel Mama – a name she earned over two decades of hand-rolling and boiling dough. Her Yuki Bagel pop-ups and market stalls across Sydney showcase her diverse, border-crossing range.

Her everything bagel, for instance, is a seed-crusted tribute to the New York staple: studded with sesame and dried garlic for full-flavoured punch. She wants to transport you to the Big Apple with each bite.

But what makes her baked goods truly stand out is how she stretches and shapes her dough into adorable forms. Perhaps you’ve seen her baby matcha turtles and kransky bagel dogs at a recent Diggy Doos Coffee pop-up in the CBD? Or her cat-shaped pastries flavoured with Vietnamese coffee and white chocolate at Forest Lodge’s Meowments Art Mart in February?

Yamazaki’s hand-rolled pastries have also appeared at various cafes around town (Maeda, Newtown; Welcome Dose, Rosebery; Axil Coffee, Surry Hills) and she’s done pop-ups at Punpun in Darlinghurst, where she served brunch plates with bagel chips, pizza bagels and beagle-shaped pastries.

Her introduction to the ring-shaped bread took place in Japan. “I started baking bagels while working at a small local bakery in my home town, Tokyo. At the time, they only sold plain and blueberry bagels,” she says. The uniquely chewy texture intrigued her and, over time, she tried as many variations as she could, eventually making it to New York – the cradle of the modern bagel ever since European Jewish migrants brought the doughy treats there over a century ago.

“That trip completely changed everything,” Yamazaki says. She was struck by what she sampled and how different the bagels were. “After returning to Japan, I started experimenting on my own, learning from online recipes and constantly improving. It took me more than 10 years to develop my own recipe.”

She jokes that she’s tried “a million” versions of the baked staple, from New York’s Ess-a-Bagel and Montreal’s St-Viateur Bagel to Tokyo’s Maruichi Bagel. Diverse influences have led to the unique Yuki approach, which incorporates New York and Japanese styles.

“I use kosher salt and boil [the bagels] with molasses syrup to create that classic NYC flavour and shine,” she says. The baker also showcases the flavours of her birthplace – hojicha tea, mochi rice cakes, kuri chestnut paste – in animal shapes that are “kawaii”. Her signature matcha turtle bagels, for instance, resemble Japan’s beloved melonpan.

“I wanted to share the beauty of Japanese culture. I’m inspired by anime and manga, and also by my mum, who always encouraged me to create things when I was a child,” she says. “The hardest bagels to make are detailed animal shapes, especially stuffed ones like bear bagels. I’m still working on improving my mochi-filled bagels. It’s challenging to include a lot of filling while keeping the shape – but I want every bagel to feel like a surprise when you cut it open!”

If you ripped into her matcha cat at Meowments Art Mart, for instance, you would’ve encountered a vividly purple ooze of sweet potato paste. But the vibrant fillings aren’t the only way Yuki Bagel has made an impact. Last year, Japanese influencer Shinichi Mine (aka Tabieats Shinichi) described the chef’s creations as “some of the best bagels ever”, name-checking her rendang flavour and calling her Diggy Doos Coffee pop-up a Sydney highlight.

It’s a good reason to drop by her upcoming appearance at the Big Japanese Market in Crows Nest on Saturday March 21. Can’t make it? Don’t worry, she’ll be hand-rolling her animal-shaped pastries for a while yet. “I’m planning to join more art markets and do pop-ups throughout the year.”

@yukibageljp9