The bagel and New York are inseparable. While there are no official statistics on the daily production of this little bread ring, it is sold by about 500 independent specialty shops in the city, according to Sam Silverman, executive director of BagelUp.
He has evolved a lot since his arrival in New York. The exact date is still debated but historians agree that it was towards the end of the 19th century.
Its popularity has grown in the Lower East Side, the southeast of the island of Manhattan, populated by the Jewish community arriving from Poland where the bagel has been eaten for several centuries already.
In 1900, New York had seventy stores.
But the working conditions were “terrible”, says Maria Balinska in her book The Bagel : The Surprising History of a Modest Bread (“The Bagel: The Surprising Story of a Modest Bread”), dedicated to a bakers’ strike in 1909 that led to better wages and working conditions, initiating a larger social movement.
The Roaring Twenties
The craze for the iconic version – the “lox” bagel, namely smoked salmon and cheese spread – began in the interwar period and has never waned. It was a best-seller in Jewish delicatessens.
Ashley Dikos, wife of Bo’s Bagels owner Andrew Martinez, showing cream cheese and salmon bagels at Bo’s Bagels in New York on July 12, 2023. (Credit: Yuki Iwamura/AFP)
Writer Jeffrey A. Marx dates the origin to the late 1920s, some 50 years after the invention of cheese spread by dairy farmer William Lawrence.
Products like smoked salmon “symbolized luxury, a reminder that the second generation had broken through the socioeconomic barriers separating poor Lower East Side immigrants from those born Americans,” Marx wrote.
For Balinska, the bagel spread beyond the Jewish community in the 1960s.
It has benefited from technological advancements like the rotary oven which has allowed for increased speeds and the ability to sell hot bagels directly to the consumer when previously they were only available from wholesalers.
The 60s
The Lender brothers were also preponderant in the “bagelization” of America by marketing a frozen bagel on a large scale from the 1960s.
One of their innovations was to sell a pre-sliced bagel to prevent consumers from injuring themselves trying to cut a frozen bagel.
Over the years, the exterior fillings have diversified (salt, sesame seeds, poppy seeds, onion, garlic, etc.) and even an “everything bagel” – or a “bagel-à-tout” – combining them all and which is now available for other products (chocolate bars, crisps, etc.).
BO’s Bagels in West Harlem sells more “everything bagels” than all other varieties combined, according to owner Andrew Martinez.
The “foodie” culture of the 21st century has given rise to more ambitious experiments next to which the traditional “lox” pales in comparison: sushi, braised pork, cheddar/chilli, not to mention all the possible and imaginable combinations of charcuterie and egg. .
Spreadable cheese was no exception with blueberry, avocado/garlic, and colorful options.
2023-08-20 15:45:07
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