I want to start yeasty discussion. It seems that the best way is to announce a position on
bagels, step back and see what rises. I searched for a thread on bagels and was surprised to see that in TFP, there is a hole in our discourse. So, before we get all twisted, I onionated, I would like to get Everything out as far as I am concerned.
I grew up eating bagels that came from the grocery store. Dempsters, Wonder, no-name what ever. And I was happy about it. Every so often I would go to a fast food (Druxy's or The Great Canadian Bagel Co.) and get a special poppy seed, sesame seed or everything bagel toasted with some cream cheese.
And I was happy.
Until I had a Montreal Style bagel from St Urbain's. Apparently these are boiled in honey water, then baked in a stone oven. the result is a denser, flavourful bagel that is not bready.
Since then I search out Montreal bagels where ever I can. In Toronto, there are two places that make them:
St Urbain's St. Lawrence Market Merchants: ST. URBAIN BAGELand
Bagel House Bagel House: History | Authentic Montreal Wood Oven Bagels in Toronto. By far the best is the latter.
I found a forum on Chowhound that discusses this (see linky below, plus a post clipped out which is quite eloquent on the topic) but I would like to see what the consensus is in TFP land on this snack:
Montreal Style?
Toronto Style?
NYC Style? (what is NYC style anyways?)
Are there other styles that are even better?
Best Bagels in Toronto - Ontario (including Toronto) - Chowhound
I always enjoy the intensity of the discussions about bagels. I agree with you that an "authentic" bagel is the kind you grew up with. Whether that authentic bagel is also a good bagel is something else entirely.
There certainly are differences among the styles popular in different communities. Either a given style tastes good to you or it doesn't; either a specific baker's rendition of that style tastes good to you or it doesn't. It's simplistic.
I have lived in New York, Montreal, and Toronto. The bagels I grew up with in New York were hand shaped, boiled in sweetened water, and then baked, just like the Montreal version. Something must differ between them because the end products are as different from each other as a white sandwich bread is from a baguette. It may be ingredients, technique, or both. It is only partly about the oven. Both styles are bagels, but they are not the same kind of bread.
The New York bagels of the fifties were quite consistent. There was a bagel baker's union, and one needed to be more-or-less born into the craft. They were much fatter than the Montreal variety, had chewy interiors, were only slightly sweet, and were virtually inedible within a few hours. They were baked in an open hearth brick oven, but I never saw wood or coal - only gas or oil. They were almost impossible to find outside of New York. I understand that a purist version of these bagels is now hard to find in New York.
It was possible to get New York-ish bagels in Toronto a couple of decades ago. A franchised place around Yonge and St Clair (where Bregmans is today) didn't do a bad job. I recall (perhaps erroneously) that Lou Bregman's original Bagel King on Eglinton and the Harbord Bakery weren't half bad.
When I lived in Montreal in the sixties, what we think of as a Montreal bagel was a VERY local phenomenon. You could get them at exactly two places, St Viateur and Fairmont, which were (and still are) a few blocks apart. They were similar, but different, and each had its rabid fans. Much sweeter than New York bagels, much thinner, and baked until much darker. The wood ovens gave a distinctive flavour and were probably hotter than the ovens in New York. Like New York bagels, they are chewy. They are edible for more hours than New York bagels, but still turn to rock within a day. Aside from these two places, there was nothing special about a Montreal bagel in the sixties. To my palate, Bagel House on Bayview makes a damn fine version today.
As to the shtetl, I doubt that anyone really knows. Many in New York shunned bagels for something called a Bialy. Bialy's apparently have known European roots, but are available only in New York. The classic New York bagel, whatever it's origins, was apparently perfected by a trade union in New York. The Montreal bagel was perfected at two bakeries in Montreal. Shtetl, shmetl... Hell, the two original makers of frozen bagels (Abel in Buffalo and Lender in West Haven Ct) could never agree on who first invented this product, which goes back only to the nineteen fifties.
Which brings us to Toronto. There is, indeed, a "Toronto bagel" and it is made by Gryfe's. I recall a published interview that described the conscious development of a fluffier bagel for "local tastes". I don't like these bagels all that much, and I personally consider tham to be "buns", but really they are indeed bagels - of a very different style.
Bagel World's twisters also seem a uniquely Toronto item and they, too, are fluffy. I don't really think of a twister as a bagel, but simply as itself. (My possibly flawed understanding is that Bagel World and Kiva's have a common origin, but I suspect this post will be killed if I posit the details.) Most other Jewish-style Toronto bagels seem to approach the New York model, though not all that well. If you like one, than it is good. Of the non-Montreal bagels I've had recently, I give the nod to Bagel World's regular (non-twister) version. Is it "authentic"? Who cares?
Which brings us to unequivocally inauthentic bagels. Bagels do not contain fat -- any fat. But today I see bagels that contain not only fat, but lard. Lard? In a bagel? THAT is a joke.