Monday Bagel Blogging

Like many a New Yorker transplanted to the Washington, DC area, I've spent a fair amount of time bemoaning the lack of high-quality bagel options in this town. Well, yesterday my friend Tom kindly brought a few of Bodo's Bagels over to our house from Charlottesville and while my keen bagel sense has probably eroded thanks to years of atrophy, I have to say that they're . . . pretty darn good. As they boast here:

We boil our bagels just before baking, per New York style.
(If they're not boiled first, they're not authentic "NY style.")

Quite so. And now for my modest proposal. American Jews are well-known for our proclivities for philanthropical activities. It seems to me that what we need to do is set up a bagel foundation or something that could finance the establishment of traditional bagel-making facilities America's top metro areas. Here in DC we have a Museum of American Jewish Military History which, frankly, nobody cares about. A Society for the Preservation of Decent Bagels would do the world much more good.

Comments

I had the same problem when I moved from Detroit, where good bagels abound, to Chicago, where they don't. Just another argument for Zionism.

Posted by Steve | May 14, 2007 11:25 AM

This proposal seems a bit parochial. Getting decent pastrami and lox anywhere outside of New York and Los Angeles is just as difficult as finding a quality bagel. This is oddly true even in, say, Boston, a city that happens to be both lousy with Jews and close to New York.

And there's another problem with the bagel-based proposal. Most people, I naively assume, would be fairly quick to concede the superiority of, say, the pastrami at Katz's Deli, or the transcendence of hand-sliced nova from Zabar's. The same does not seem to be true of bagels. At least part of the reason that bagels are so wretched in most of the country is that people actually seem to like big fluffy bread balls studded with ingredients like blueberries.

So what I'm suggesting is that you broaden the proposal to include a variety of Jewish foods. Pastrami can be the Trojan horse we use to sneak real bagels, whitefish, and pickled herring into their midst.

Posted by Adam | May 14, 2007 11:34 AM

Au contraire, Steve. The logical endpoint of Zionism is that decent bagels will be completely unobtainable outside Eretz Israel.

Posted by ajay | May 14, 2007 11:35 AM

Adam: but can't those other foods be shipped relatively easily? Salami and lox keep pretty well. Bagels can be frozen, but it makes them tougher. You really need local bagel production.

The Chesapeake Bagel Bakery chain produces the best bagels I've encountered in the DC area, but there aren't very many of them. Also, I'm a gentile, so take that opinion for what it's worth.

Posted by tom | May 14, 2007 11:40 AM

A similar problem with this proposal is that Montreal style bagels are clearly superior to the New York kind. I don't think this can be questioned and would have to included in any decent Bagel Preservation Society.

Posted by guilty | May 14, 2007 11:42 AM

The logical endpoint of Zionism is that decent bagels will be completely unobtainable outside Eretz Israel.

It's worse than that. The logic of the Zionist program is the complete elimination of Diaspora cuisine. Over there, Jews eat Middle Eastern food -- falafel and so forth.

Posted by Matthew Yglesias | May 14, 2007 11:44 AM

I'm all for it. We desperately need real bagels in Denver. And I can't even find a knish, even a bad one. I haven't had a knish since, well, the last time I was in New York. The knish needs to be added to the society's list of things to preserve.

Posted by fostert | May 14, 2007 11:49 AM

Whole grain bread can be much better tasting than a bagel.

And pastrami and corned beef are each way too fatty.

But lox is good.

Posted by brooklyn | May 14, 2007 11:54 AM

Someone should take notice of the role of New York City water in the superiority of the bagels there (and the pizza, of course). Perhaps the society could start agitating for a pipeline system, at least to bagel shops along the eastern seaboard.

Posted by jbl | May 14, 2007 12:01 PM

When my father, a New York Jew, met my mother, an Israeli and the daughter of early Zionist settlers, he claimed that she could not be Jewish, because she was completely unfamiliar with bagels and lox.

Posted by peep | May 14, 2007 12:05 PM

As a Native New Yorker, I consider the pinnacle of bagels not to be those from NYC but from Montreal. There's a... je ne sais... seriously, it's true.

Posted by Howard | May 14, 2007 12:13 PM

Matthew: ``NY bagel'' purists like you get on my nerves. Whatsabagel and Bethesda Bagels were fine by me when I lived in DC, and I'm a born and raised NY Jew who had bagels almost every Sunday when I was growing up.

I will concede tho that bagels of any quality are in short supply in Paris, where I live now.

Posted by Evan | May 14, 2007 12:13 PM

Uh, wouldn't a 'foundation that can finance the establishment of traditional bagel-making' be called...a bagel shop?

Actually, years ago, I worked in a bakery and we used a machine to roll the bagels, hand-tied them, dipped them as described, and got a damn good bagel in white, whole wheat, and rye. Labor intensive, pricey, and always good sellers. But not, I hasten to add, NYC bagels.

A NY food that might actually need a philanthropic charity to preserve it would be the egg creme. Nobody raised more than 30 miles from Manhattan can even imagine why it exists.

Posted by serial catowner | May 14, 2007 12:19 PM

I'll also plug Bethesda Bagels, as well as Georgetown Bagelry, who have always been pretty solid for me.

Posted by David Schraub | May 14, 2007 12:19 PM

Alas, I have been away from C'Ville too long. I miss Bodo's bagels.

There was a proper bagel place on the side of Austin that I live, but due to marital strife in the owners family, they were evicted, and too broke to open another.

Maybe I can move back to C'Ville, or somewhere on the East Coast where good bagels aren't such a scarce item.

Posted by David (Austin Tx) | May 14, 2007 12:24 PM

> Someone should take notice of the role of
> New York City water in the superiority of
> the bagels there (and the pizza, of course).

Which is exactly zero, since both can and have been reproduced in other locations with different water.

What is very hard to reproduce is the willingness of immigrants bakers from the 1920s to the 1940s to work from 2 AM to 4 PM six days a week, following methods as precise as those in any chemistry laboratory exactly hundreds of thousands of times until age 80 or death whichever came first. Some of their children followed them into the business, but none of their grandchildren. Hence no more old-fashioned bagel bakeries (a bit of an exaggeration but not much - even since 1980 the number that have disappeared is substantial).

Cranky

Posted by Cranky Observer | May 14, 2007 12:26 PM

I've heard the same thing about Montreal.

Posted by JP | May 14, 2007 12:29 PM

Without a doubt, Bodo's is fantastic, and cheap. Cleay the solution is for them to open locations in the Washington area. Unfortunately, each Bodo's takes ten years to build, so it could be a while.

Posted by Andrew | May 14, 2007 12:31 PM

Like David (Austin Tx), I am a one-time Charlottesvillian who misses Bodo's. Nothing nearly as good in Columbus.

And why didn't I take the available bets on Warriors in 6?

Posted by Bill Gardner | May 14, 2007 12:33 PM

I'm suddenly struck by the urge to do an Unfogged-style "17 to 6" comment, utilizing this post and the one about oenophiles.

Posted by Quarterican | May 14, 2007 12:36 PM

Bagel City on Rockville Pike.

Posted by Tom S | May 14, 2007 12:37 PM

in the Chicago area:

New York Bagel, on Dempster in Skokie.

believe it or not, Skokie knows from bagels.

Posted by midwest | May 14, 2007 12:51 PM

As a native Long Islander, I sympathize and wholeheartedly endorse your bagel snobbery. I've found Einstein Bros. to have the best bagels in the DC area, but I haven't tried the others mentioned above.

As an aside, I always enjoy others' astonishment when I tell them that bagel stores are as ubiquitous back home as coffee shops are here.

Posted by Cain | May 14, 2007 12:53 PM

Is there anyplace in the world that doesn't boil the bagels before baking them? Isn't that what makes it a bagel?

Posted by too many steves | May 14, 2007 12:54 PM

Adam: but can't those other foods be shipped relatively easily? Salami and lox keep pretty well. Bagels can be frozen, but it makes them tougher.

Lox can be shipped, but I'm not sure it's any easier to ship than bagels. In fact, I can't think of a food that is much more perishable than lox. The reason people ship lox and not bagels, I have to assume, is that lox is much more expensive than bagels. Spending $20 to express ship $100 worth of lox is an extravagance, but justifiable. Spending $20 to ship $12 worth of bagels is just goofy.

None of this really argues against your call for local production, of course. But in general, most people aren't going to ship lox to themselves. I'm sure not. I want it available around the corner.

And pastrami and corned beef are each way too fatty.

Total non sequitur.

Posted by Adam | May 14, 2007 12:57 PM

We boil our bagels just before baking, per New York style.

(If they're not boiled first, they're not authentic "NY style.")

Um, if they're not boiled first, they're not bagels at all.

The Bagel in Chicago comes as close to NY style as I've seen outside NY. Nobody matches up to Montreal, though.

Posted by brenda | May 14, 2007 1:07 PM

For pity's sake, did Wheaton fall off of the map? Get your ass on the Red line and heas over to the Bagel Master near Wheaton Plaza.

Posted by Sharon | May 14, 2007 1:18 PM

"Here in DC we have a Museum of American Jewish Military History which, frankly, nobody cares about. "

More accurately, people care about the disconnect between the hawkish punditry of so many Jews in recent years and the paucity of Jews risking life in limb in the military. If I were an American Jewish pundit who supported the Iraq war, I'd probably stick to writing about health care policy or something for the next decade or so.

Posted by Juan | May 14, 2007 1:29 PM

There's two NY Bagel/NY Bialy places -- the other is on Touhy east of Cicero.

Anybody who claims they couldn't find a good bagel in Chicago clearly has never set foot in greater West Rogers Park [i.e. + Skokie/Niles and bits of Evanston].

Posted by dbt | May 14, 2007 1:31 PM

Forget about New York bagels: anyone who has ever tasted the Montreal species (especially those of the St-Viateur or Fairmount bagel bakeries) will immediately know that there are none better on this planet.

Posted by Hal | May 14, 2007 1:33 PM

Bodo's...home of quality bagels and the most pungent Caesar salad dressing ever created.

Posted by Mike P | May 14, 2007 1:37 PM

Mike P: excellent potato salad and lemonade, too. Really, I can't sing Bodo's praises enough. It's just a really great place to get a cheap meal (I'm partial to the capicola sandwich).

Posted by tom | May 14, 2007 1:42 PM

Is there any place in the SF Bay Area where one might obtain an authentic NY pre-boiled bagel?

Or do we have to get Gavin Newsom to give a Balfour declaration, but applicable to NY Ashkenazis only?

Also, where can I get Irish Soda bread in San Francisco?

Posted by Sock Puppet of the Great Satan | May 14, 2007 1:45 PM

I've found that Bethesda Bagels are OK if they're a day old.

Posted by MattF | May 14, 2007 1:48 PM

How exactly are NY bagels different from the kind you can buy anywhere else in specialty bagel shops? I'm from Scottsdale, Arizona, where we had a decent number of Jews and some pretty excellent bagels.

The main problem in places like DC and Boston, it seems, isn't that the bagels you can buy are somehow inauthentic or not up to par, but just that you can't buy them anywhere. Apart from truly mediocre chain shops like Cosi and Einstein Bros., I can't think of a single place to buy fresh bagels in the whole of the Dupont/Farragut/Adams Morgan/U St. area.

Posted by Alex | May 14, 2007 2:06 PM

To Brooklyn re healthy eating: http://aclu.org/pizza/images/screen.swf

To Sock Puppet of the Great Satan: Irish soda bread is dead easy and fast to make at home. See for example: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Irresistible-Irish-Soda-Bread/Detail.aspx

Bagels can be made at home also (been there, done that), but they're much more trouble.

Posted by bemused | May 14, 2007 2:46 PM

How exactly are NY bagels different from the kind you can buy anywhere else in specialty bagel shops?

It's like trying to describe sex to a virgin. You could describe it as really awesome masturbation, but that wouldn't really do it justice, would it?

For what it's worth, most bagel shops in New York itself have fallen down in recent years, producing something a lot larger and breadier than a bagel is supposed to be. The best place I know to get a bagel is the Bagel Hole in Brooklyn (7th Ave between 12th and 13th Sts), where the bagels are small, dense, moist, and chewy. When I bring samples to friends and force them to taste, only then do they understand the difference.

Posted by Antid Oto | May 14, 2007 2:56 PM

If you are ever in London, try Beigel Bake in Brick Lane, they boil them before baking them (the last time I looked). They also do a mean salt beef sandwich on rye with caraway seeds. Go easy on the mustard though if you want to retain your sanity, the mustard could be used as a WMD!

Posted by blowback | May 14, 2007 3:26 PM

Ay, caramba

You have JUST NOW discovered Bodo's?!?!?!?! This seems kind of sad and, well, strange to me. You must know at least a couple of people who went to U.-Va. And they are either recent acquaintences or have not been very good friends if they have only now decided it would be a good idea to share the Bodo's goodness with you.

Back in the 90s (see how I'm weaving the threads? see?) we had to pile in the car to get our Bodo's hangover egg-bagel-sandwich recovery on, as the only one in town was far from Grounds. However, now I hear there is one right nearby. If ONLY we had been able to stumble down to Bodo's from our apartment, the way we were able to stumble down to the Baja Bean...

Sigh. I'm so old now.

Meanwhile, my Zen just played Sugar, which IS 90s. More 90s goodness up now, Too Much Joy (who I really wish had never broken up so I could still go to shows and jump around like crazy). FINALLY!

Posted by ajw_93 | May 14, 2007 3:40 PM

From one Jewish Matt to another, might I suggest that you get your Bagels in Baltimore?
Heck, you could even take the MARC train to the subway here, and never get in your car!
Goldman and Pariser's bakeries are just fine (I favor the former).
BTW, if you call a couple of Chabads in your area, you will probably find something local.
Good Bialys in this area, that's tough, but bagels, that's easy.

Posted by Matthew Saroff | May 14, 2007 4:12 PM

Steve,

Where are the best Bagel's in Detroit?

Posted by crack | May 14, 2007 4:19 PM

Montreal Bagel. The king of Bagels. Only down side is you have to eat it in 2 days or it goes as hard as steel plate from an M1 Tank.

In contrast with the New York-style bagel, the Montreal bagel is smaller, sweeter and denser, with a larger hole, and is always baked in a wood-fired oven. It contains malt, egg, and no salt, and is boiled in honey-sweetened water before being baked in a wood-fired oven, whose irregular flames give it a random dappled light-and-dark surface colour. There are two predominant varieties: black-seed (poppyseed), or white-seed (sesame seed). Some purists object to any variation on this theme, though most bagel bakeries now offer many additional varieties (including Matzah-like flat breads).

Posted by Northern Observer | May 14, 2007 5:28 PM

My father, who grew up in an apartment over a bagel bakery in Brooklyn in the 1920's, was no fan of the modern NY bagel. Too big, too puffy, too bready. Real bagels were small and dense with a big hole, like a coil of rope. But you had to eat them fresh in the morning - by noon they were hard as rocks.

Sounds to me like the Montreal bagel is closer to the original recipe. You can see why a bread product that is too stale to eat after 6 hours doesn't have much vendor appeal in the modern USA.

Posted by Bloix | May 14, 2007 5:44 PM

Ahah! The Daily Forward says that the "NY style" bagel is not authentic. The recipe was modified for use with automated bagel-rolling machines that burned out on the dough, and wood-fired stoves are banned in NYC:

"But the bagels sold at Dunkin’ Donuts, Starbucks and even at well-respected spots like H&H are a far cry from the smaller, doughier rounds made by the Local 338. When bagel-making machines were introduced, the original recipe for stiff, gluten-heavy dough burned the motors of the automated machines, so water was added. Later machines necessitated the addition of oil and other additives, and malt was often eliminated from the mix.
Today, Goodman says it is near impossible to find old-style, hand-rolled bagels. Diehard bagel mavens often travel to Montreal, where the wood-fired ovens banned Stateside are still used to produce a charred, almost pizza crust.

http://www.forward.com/articles/filling-in-the-holes/

Posted by Bloix | May 14, 2007 5:58 PM

You can get authentic New York bagels in San Francisco at the Crossroads Cafe on Delancy Street just off 200 Brannan in SF operated by Delancy Street Foundation which flies them in from NYC. I always purchased my bagels in Columbus Ohio at Schwartz's Bakery which may or may not be in business anymore (Dave Schwartz, son of Willie, who founded it got tired of waking up so early and decided, I hear, to sleep in a few more hours and became a stockbroker instead. Good thing it was not in SF or he might have only gotten an hour or so more sleep).

Posted by Jim | May 14, 2007 6:06 PM

Bloix: Exactly. Bagel Hole bagels are high gluten and I believe hand-rolled.

Posted by Antid Oto | May 14, 2007 7:57 PM

As an ex-10 year DC'er, this thread makes me very sad, because, Matt, with the recent demise of Sid at Comet Deli and LIquor on 18th and Columbia, you miss out on what was a steady supply of boiled in NYC, shipped down and baked fresh in the store H&H bagels, along with high end cream cheese, and black and white cookies.

Not only that, you missed knowing one of the greatest guys i've been lucky to know. Used to work 14 hr days for fun in his 80s even though I think he was a millionaire, carried the last gun license grandfathered in DC, employed ex-cons, survived the 68 riots intact (alone among white business owners on 14th), had all sorts of people hanging round a table of 8 every morning for a high end bullshit session.

I think he also played minor league ball for the old Senators and his high school basketball coach was Red Auerbach (!). He was a Adams Morgan institution, the Post ran a great obit for him, and its making me miss the old neighborhood just writing this.

And those were proper bagels.

PS
In London, not just Brick Lane, really Golders Green and Finchley Park have more excellent delis and bagel stores.

Posted by Christian | May 14, 2007 9:06 PM

Bodos--I miss it. Eat there every time I'm back in Charlottesville. Interesting line system, too.

Posted by Nick | May 14, 2007 9:48 PM

Matthew Yglesias says:

"Here in DC we have a Museum of American Jewish Military History which, frankly, nobody cares about. A Society for the Preservation of Decent Bagels would do the world much more good."

This is what the museum is all about:

"The National Museum of American Jewish Military History, under the auspices of the Jewish War Veterans of the USA, documents and preserves the contributions of Jewish Americans to the peace and freedom of the United States, educates the public concerning the courage, heroism and sacrifices made by Jewish Americans who served in the armed forces, and works to combat anti-Semitism."

As a Jewish veteran I care about this very much.

Who make Yglesias the chief Rabbi in charge of Museums?

Posted by apter | May 14, 2007 9:48 PM

Matthew Yglesias says:

"Here in DC we have a Museum of American Jewish Military History which, frankly, nobody cares about. A Society for the Preservation of Decent Bagels would do the world much more good."

This is what the museum is all about:

"The National Museum of American Jewish Military History, under the auspices of the Jewish War Veterans of the USA, documents and preserves the contributions of Jewish Americans to the peace and freedom of the United States, educates the public concerning the courage, heroism and sacrifices made by Jewish Americans who served in the armed forces, and works to combat anti-Semitism."

As a Jewish veteran I care about this very much.

Who made Yglesias the chief Rabbi in charge of Museums?

Posted by apter | May 14, 2007 9:49 PM

I believe it when you say that American Jews are well-known for philantropic activity, but you all need to blow that horn a little louder 'cause I hadn't heard it. And I read the papers. I'm hip totally to lots of Christian charity stuff, but that's probably 'cause I was brought up to be a Christian. Seriously, I think we need to know much, much more about Jewish charitable works, and Muslim charitable works. Etc. Accentuate the positive. We love the good folk.

Posted by ferd | May 15, 2007 2:48 AM

Anyway, I think Harry Morgan's in Oxford Market for lunch..

Posted by Alex | May 15, 2007 6:43 AM

Ride report: Morgan's bagels were chewy but light, salt beef salty and tender, gherkins fresh and spiky. Coffee excellent. Far from cheap, though. Had I known I'd have had the chicken knidlaunch soup.

Posted by Alex | May 15, 2007 8:55 AM

As a transplanted New Orleanian in DC I constantly bemoan not being able to find a good fried shrimp po-boy and am constantly trying to understand the concept of steaming seafood and putting that Old Bay stuff on the outside of the meat and not boiling the seafood with spices.

Don't even get me started on the coffee. Starbucks is not as good as Community, CDM, or French Market coffee.

Posted by ET | May 15, 2007 9:19 AM

"Don't even get me started on the coffee. Starbucks is not as good as Community, CDM, or French Market coffee."

Never tried French Market coffee, but I have tried Community and CDM and they suck ass. Chickory? Crap people cut coffee with when coffee was too expensive to drink straight. Try drinking that stuff black and you'll see how bad it is. When you're washing down a beignet with it, and you've got cream and sugar in your coffee it's a different thing entirely.

Posted by Juan | May 15, 2007 12:43 PM

Matthew, thanks for the kind words re: Bodo's. It's a shame that we feel that we need to specify that our bagels are boiled before baking, but there are eateries that take round dough, bake it on, say, sheet pans, and call 'em bagels. Oh, the horror!

I do think that the particular qualities of a local water supply are as essential to the New York bagel as the microbes in the air are essential to, say, a San Francisco sourdough starter. The Charlottesville water's not too shabby, but it doesn't have the bagel-enhancing reputation of the liquid gold flowing out of the Adirondacks.

And I'd happily support a local chapter of SPDB. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

Posted by John K. | May 19, 2007 4:19 PM