Sieve the flour into a large bowl. Add the yeast to one side of the bowl and salt to the opposite side. Do not let them touch yet.

Add the sugar and Chinese Five Spice into the middle and mix everything with a spoon until equally distributed.

Make a well in the middle of your dry ingredients. Add the water and black food colouring and mix until you get a rough ball of dough. Add more black food colouring if needed.

Turn your dough out onto a clean and floured surface. Knead by hand for around 10 minutes. If using a standing/electric hand mixer with a dough hook attachment, knead for around 5 minutes. The dough will be shiny and elastic when ready.

Place your ball of dough into a clean and lightly oiled bowl and cover with cling film/beeswax paper/a damp tea towel.

Allow to rise for 1 hour (preferably in a warm place like a warm kitchen or an airing cupboard).

When your dough has doubled in size, tip it out onto a clean and floured surface.

Shape 11 balls from the dough – weighing will help to keep them even. First weigh all of your dough and then divide by 11. Mine weighed around 70g each.

Place the balls of dough on two greased and lined baking trays: 5 on one and 6 on the other.

Cover again and allow to rise for 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on the warmth of the area you are keeping them in. They will be ready when they have roughly doubled in size and are puffy looking.

Preheat your oven to 180 [325F] or 160 fan.

Push your finger into some flour and then, using that same finger, make a hole in the centre of each ball of dough. Stretch it out a little using your finger but be careful not to knock all of the air out.

Once all of your bagels have holes in, put some water into a deep pan and bring it to the boil.

When the water is boiling, add the bicarbonate of soda. This is what gives the bagels their shine and chewiness.

Doing either one or more bagel(s) at a time (depending on the size of your pot), place them in the water with a slotted spoon. Try to keep them from touching.

Keep the bagel(s) in the boiling water for 1 minute, turning over after 30 seconds to do both sides.

Remove your bagel(s) from the water with the slotted spoon, making sure to drain well and place them back onto the baking trays.

Repeat this process until you have done all of your bagels.

Brush the bagels with the egg white and sprinkle on the black sesame seeds.

Bake your bagels for around 25 minutes. They will look shiny and will sound hollow when tapped on underneath once baked through.

Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Once cool, top them with the candy eyes (or whatever alternative you are choosing for the eyes). I used a little butter on each one to help “glue” them on, but you can just as easily use edible glue or no glue at all, if you plan on just laying them down for presentation and removing the eyes for eating.