Did you miss the Bagel Festival that was held in Brooklyn last weekend?  I did not go but I heard all about it on the WNYC-93.9 show All of It.  Bagel purveyors and lovers came out in droves to taste and decide which were the best.

The bagel’s first written reference was noted in the Krakow Jewish Council of 1610. The word beigen is the Yiddish word for “to bend”.  We know that bagels arrived in NYC in the early 1900’s from the shtetl immigrants of Eastern Europe.  Many people who move from New York say that the one thing they miss the most is their NY bagel.

Why are NYC bagels considered the best.  Apparently, there are three reasons: the water, hand rolling, and rolling them on wooden boards instead of metal ones.  Did you know that bagel snobs consider toasting and scooping unacceptable. Bagels should be crunchy to the bite and never feel like a spongy roll.

I must admit that my favorite is a scooped and toasted everything with scallion cream cheese.

What do you order at your local bagel stop?