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Yet another New York-based publication thinks the Bay Area has great bagels.
Three Bay Area bagel spots were featured in a Bon Appétit feature, The Very Best Bagels in the US (Yes, Outside New York): Midnite Bagel and Chicken Dog Bagels in San Francisco and Poppy Bagels in Oakland all made the cut.
J.’s Alix Wall visited Midnite Bagel in 2020, interviewing owner and head baker Nick Beitcher. Born in San Francisco and raised in New York, Beitcher got his start in baking at the famous Tartine Bakery and worked there for eight years before setting out on his own. Midnite’s bagels use wheat and rye flours sourced from the Pacific Northwest and fermented with a unique sourdough culture. Bon Appétit called them “powerfully tart and deeply flavorful.” Beitcher and his bagels can be found at the Ferry Building Farmers Market on Saturdays, the Outer Sunset and Stonestown farmers markets on Sundays, or daily at the Dogpatch Commissary.
Chicken Dog Bagels come highly recommended — the San Francisco Chronicle listed them among the top bagels in the Bay Area earlier this year. Open only on Fridays and Saturdays, Chicken Dog Bagels runs as a pop-up out of Avedano’s Meats, an Italian deli and market in Bernal Heights. According to Bon Appétit, the shop gets its name from baker Alex Roger’s Chihuahua. Rogers reportedly hand-rolls small batches of bagels using organic local flour and sourdough leavening that sell out every week. On Saturdays, he offers sandwiches featuring lox, trout and smokey beet toppings. Bon Appétit recommends the cinnamon raisin bagel.
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Rounding out Bon Appétit’s recommendations is Poppy Bagels in Oakland. Poppy opened just this February (J. stopped by) and has been a runaway hit. Started by Reesa Kashuk out of her apartment in 2020, Poppy has gone from a farmers market staple to a fixture of its Temescal neighborhood in just a few years. Kashuk’s bagels are hand-rolled and her sandwiches feature a rotating cast of in-season produce. Poppy is open 6:30am-1:30pm Thursday through Sunday, but bagels often sell out before noon. Visit on weekdays for a secret menu item—a delicious egg and cheese bagel.
California bagels have been a hot topic for years. J. readers will remember when, in 2021, the New York Times announced that the best bagels were, in fact, in California. Years before that, New York Times Magazine asked, “Why is it so hard to get a good bagel in California?”
The answer today? It’s not.