A New York Bagel From an Unexpected Borough: Connecticut

An extended line for bagels in New York Metropolis isn’t a exceptional sight. It’s, although, when the bagels come from Connecticut.

On a latest Sunday, dozens of New Yorkers crowded contained in the Manhattan West location of Every day Provisions, desperate to snag the bubbled, golden-hued wares of Popup Bagels, a bakery in Redding, Conn., that has been staging pop-ups round Manhattan since final yr.

Is that this the perfect new bagel in New York? It will depend on what you want. Whereas at this time’s New York bagels are sometimes massive, with a dense crumb and a definite chew, Popup’s are smaller, airier and crisper. The feel is considerably like that of a baguette.

Having one thing noteworthy to say about bagels in New York is a feat; the town is filled with distinctive variations — from the plump, hand-rolled specimens at Ess-a-Bagel to the skinnier Montreal-style rounds at Black Seed Bagels.

However the proprietor of Popup Bagels, Adam Goldberg, thinks that there was little latest innovation in New York bagels, and that the present crop of choices isn’t as much as previous requirements. “I believe there’s limitless room for excellent bagel retailers wherever in any city in America, together with in New York Metropolis,” he mentioned.

After lower than two years in enterprise, Popup Bagels has a devoted following within the metropolis, some 60 miles from the place the dough is made. At its pop-ups during the last yr inside eating places in Manhattan and the Hamptons, the bagels — which should be preordered — have bought out in as little as a minute. In October, they received the folks’s-choice award on the Brooklyn BagelFest, beating better-known native bakeries like Tompkins Sq. Bagels.

“Folks sometimes consider New Yorkers as traditionalists which might be set of their methods and frequent these establishments which have been round,” mentioned Sam Silverman, the founding father of Brooklyn BagelFest. “We are literally very open-minded.”

Mr. Goldberg, 47, doesn’t take into account himself a bagel knowledgeable. He was considered one of many individuals who began baking bread in the course of the pandemic to go the time. Sooner or later in the summertime of 2020, he and his cousin Jeff Lewis determined they have been bored with sourdough bread, and needed to attempt making one thing completely different. Why not bagels?

They regarded up a couple of recipes on-line to get a way of the ingredient ratios and method, then got here up with an concept for his or her dream bagel: compact, with a clearly outlined crust and a beneficiant coating of seeds.

New York Occasions Cooking: Discover ways to make bagels with Claire Saffitz.

Mr. Goldberg initially gave the bagels to mates and family members, and inside a couple of months, sufficient folks have been providing to pay for them that he determined to start out a enterprise. (Mr. Lewis nonetheless sometimes helps make the bagels.)

Now, along with his New York pop-ups, Mr. Goldberg runs a subscription bagel enterprise with three pickup places in Connecticut: Redding, Westport and Greenwich. Bagels are bought by the dozen for $38, and include artistic flavors of cream cheese, like grilled leek and dill pickle. Though the enterprise is worthwhile, he nonetheless works a full-time job promoting flood-mitigation methods.

Final fall, with $250,000 from buyers, Mr. Goldberg leased a take a look at kitchen in downtown Redding. On the Sunday of a latest New York pop-up, the lights went on at 5 a.m., as he and three staff — Kaylynn Gunzy, a scholar on the Parsons College of Design, and two highschool college students, Amelia Shankle and Hannah Giardina — boiled and seeded 60 dozen plain, poppy seed, sesame, salt and the whole lot bagels.

The earlier afternoon, Mr. Goldberg had combined near 200 kilos of dough and proofed it twice. (He mentioned the double proofing provides taste and makes for a softer inside and extra sturdy crust.) He then formed the bagels and allow them to chill in a single day.

“I see vitality on this dough,” he mentioned as he took a take a look at batch out of the oven. “The outlet is just not too large. There’s life right here.”

Whereas conventional bagels are sometimes boiled in a kettle and baked in a fire, his are boiled in a big stockpot and baked in a convection oven. Not as a result of he thinks this technique makes for a greater outcome — it’s simply extra handy for a roving enterprise that steadily depends on different folks’s ovens, he mentioned.

At 7 a.m., Mr. Goldberg drove the boiled-but-not-yet-baked bagels into the town in a refrigerated catering van. Clients order on-line and select a 15-minute time slot; the bagels are baked about an hour earlier than every slot, so they’re nonetheless heat at pickup.

This was the third time Pallavi Nanda, had pushed in from Jersey Metropolis for the bagels. “When you eat these, you notice what you’ve got missed,” she mentioned.

One other fan is the New York restaurateur Danny Meyer, whose Union Sq. Hospitality Group owns Every day Provisions, and who invited Mr. Goldberg to stage the pop-up there. “I’m not one to say something is the perfect model I’ve ever had of it in my life,” Mr. Meyer mentioned. “However he’s positively high three.”

Fellow bagel makers weren’t as enthused. “When you begin to change it an excessive amount of, it isn’t a bagel anymore, it’s a bread,” mentioned Melanie Frost, an proprietor of Ess-a-Bagel. “That’s nice for bread, however bagels? I don’t know.”

Nonetheless, she wished her new competitor luck: “Good for them. Folks love fads.”

Popup Bagels, 8 Predominant Avenue, Redding, Conn.; 971 Publish Street East, Westport, Conn.; 158 East Putnam Avenue, Cos Cob, Conn. (Bagels should be reserved prematurely.) For pop-up places: popupbagels.com