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Noah's Bagels

skchai

By skchai
in California: Dining

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skchai

skchai

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We had a short layover in SFO during a flight from Boston to Honolulu. We picked up a bag of Noah's Bagels, hoping to revive fond memories of our grad student days in the Bay Area. Reached in the bag - squishy, limp supermarket-style product. Aaargh - $13 bucks (remember, this is the airport) down the drain.

What happened to the Noah's we remembered? Checked out the website. Turned out that they've been bought up by the sinister-sounding "New World Restaurant Group". Can anyone provide me with some detail or context about all this?

Thanks!

Sun-Ki Chai
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~sunki/

Former Hawaii Forum Host

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Hest88

Hest88

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Noah's hasn't been privately owned in a long time. However, I remember that Noah's bagels were steamed even way back when, so I suspect some of what you may be remembering is pure nostalgia. Your tastes have probably improved considerably since then!

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marie-louise

marie-louise

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Personally, I always found Noah's bagels too light and bready to be real bagels.

They are much, much worse now, although I agree, they never were chewy enough. Now they are almost inedible. I used to get wonderful lox and cream cheese bagels there, and challah which was only sold on Fridays, and Hamentashen(sp?) that were only made for Purim. They closed during Pesach. They don't have egg bagels anymore-although they have bagels with unbelievable amounts of crap in them.

At least I hear Noah used the money he made on the sale well-I recall hearing he used most of it to start some sort of charitable organization.

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merle

merle

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They also don't maintain any inventory. In the downtown Oakland area, I've gone in at 11am, only to find they're out of everything but egg bagels and plain onces (and one or two I don't like, like sun-dried tomatoes and asiago).

At the Lakeshore site they never have condiments. Nothing like getting them halfway through making a sandwich, only to find they have no mustard and no mayonnaise. Huh? And they didn't warn me up front?

I just don't go there anymore. I miss bagels, but not that badly.

Merle's recent meals out [lj]
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Gary Soup

Gary Soup

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Noah's hasn't been privately owned in a long time. However, I remember that Noah's bagels were steamed even way back when, so I suspect some of what you may be remembering is pure nostalgia. Your tastes have probably improved considerably since then!

I lean toward your interpretation.

I've heard it said that they don't even make real New York bagels in New York anymore.

House of Bagels out on Geary makes bagels that are pretty close to what New York Bagels USED to be.

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Stone

Stone

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Posted (edited)

I think the New World Restaurant Group is the comination of New World Coffee and Manhattan Bagels. (I don't think this Manhattan Bagels is related to the Manhattan Bagels in SF, though, but I'm not sure.) I wouldn't expect much from them by way of either.

Edited by Stone (log)
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jschyun

jschyun

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Are you talking about the one on Durant and Telegraph in Berkeley? I ate there a couple times during the early to mid 90's and I remember getting a good lox on bagel because they loaded it with lots of lox and cream cheese, capers, thin red onion slices, tomato, all for $4.50 I think. It was a decent meal for a starving student, but they don't do it anymore. It wasn't Russ & Daughters belly lox, with a real bagel, but good for California.

Noah's bagels were always steamed. But I admit to liking them once upon a time.

I love cold Dinty Moore beef stew. It is like dog food! And I am like a dog.

--NeroW

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merle

merle

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Are you talking about the one on Durant and Telegraph in Berkeley?  I ate there  a couple times during the early to mid 90's (...)

That's probably not the one OP got bagels from (since it's nowhere near SFO).

But you're right; that particular Noah's during that timeframe was pretty good. But even that one is pretty sad nowadays (although you wouldn't know it from the line out the door!).

Noah's now occupies the same niche in my head as Starbuck's or Subway: "place that is for some reason very popular, but which holds no interest for me, and which has a branch every couple of blocks to prevent people from escaping".

Not to sound too antagonistic: there must be something about those places that attracts so many people. I'm just not the target market.

Merle's recent meals out [lj]
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skchai

skchai

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Thanks so for all your informative replies. . .

The Noah's that I used to frequent was the one on College Ave. in Berkeley. I believe that was the original location. But you're right that my taste buds may have been too gullible in those days and conditioned by substandard stuff. I can't say they're any more sophisticated today, however!

I did notice that when Noah's opened a location on Univ. Ave. in Palo Alto in the mid-90s it wasn't nearly as good as the College Ave. one. I believe that was before the company got bought up.

As to why the ersatz bagel is so popular - I guess the same reason that people prefer Wonder bread - it's soft, squishy and not challenging to eat. Similarly the super-size bagel can be explained by the super-size muffin or cookie - people are used to "good food" with "large quantity". Now that sounds really antagonistic!

Sun-Ki Chai
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~sunki/

Former Hawaii Forum Host

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Gary Soup

Gary Soup

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According to the Noah's blurb on the New World Restaurant Group's website, Noah's Bagels is "designed to whimsically imitate an authentic New York deli." So maybe what they are shooting for is a whimsical imitation of an authentic New York bagel. Nothing wrong with whimsy, but it's no way to design food (unless you happen to be Ferran Adria).

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  • 2 weeks later...
marlena spieler

marlena spieler

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House of Bagels out on Geary makes bagels that are pretty close to what New York Bagels USED to be.

definately, yeah!

and go early in the morning when they are boiling and baking, and you can watch the guys boiling next door, and eat the bagels hot and chewy and fragrant fresh out of the oven.

last trip to new york ( i live in england) i brought back a dozen onion, garlic, everything, and plain bagels from ess-a-bagel on 1st ave which are pretty good. i stashed them in my freezer, and alas, i have just eaten the last one. whattami gonna do now?

they have bagels here, but they are not nice bagels. i'd better stick with toasted pain poilane for breakfast, pain poilane being the most wonderful bread i know.

x

marlena

Marlena the spieler

www.marlenaspieler.com

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