Voyage Of The Bagel -- An Old World Staple Adapts, Survives And Thrives

TO CALL A FOOD ITEM that's been around for about 400 years a fad may seem audacious, if not downright silly. But for the past five years a growing bagel fad has been sweeping Seattle - and the rest of the nation, as well.

The bagel is the latest in a line of once-exclusively ethnic staples (like tacos, espresso and pizzas) to become an American fascination food.

Bagels once found only in neighborhood Jewish bakeries and delicatessens are now being purveyed to enthusiastic lines of munchers inside urban and suburban supermarkets, in many instances baked and sold on the spot.

The bagel is not just another hard roll (or semi-hard roll, or medium-soft roll). It's a very distinct kind of round yeast roll or bread with a hole in its center and a traceable past. Bagels are a part of Jewish history, thought to have originated with eastern and central European Jews around 1600.

It is a bread with a three-step cooking-baking procedure. A yeast dough is made, typically with flour, sugar, salt, water and egg yolk. After a brief rise, a fairly soft dough is punched down, rolled into a "rope," cut into lengths and formed into 3- to 4-inch circles, with the ends pinched together. After a second rise, they are slid into a kettle of gently boiling water (often sweetened with honey or malt) and simmered for about 7 minutes. After removal and short cooling, they are placed in a medium-hot oven (375 degrees), baked for 10 minutes, removed and brushed with an egg white-water glaze, which gives the bagels their characteristic shiny finish, and baked again for about 20 minutes.

They are best when cooled and served fresh.

The first mention of a bagel in print was recorded in 1610 in Krakow, Poland, where it was cited as a gift for women in childbirth (according to Leo Rosten's "The Joys of Yiddish"). It arrived in America, notably in the inner cities of the Eastern seaboard, much later. The first notice of the bagel in print in this country didn't occur until 1932 (thanks to John Mariani's "Dictionary of American Food & Drink").

I first tasted them at a Jewish delicatessen in West Haven, Conn., as a child during the Second World War, and later in New York City, where Jewish friends from the University of Connecticut had them almost ritualistically with Sunday morning breakfasts, usually with lox, cream cheese and The New York Times Review of Books.

I didn't much care for them. Raised in an immigrant German-American family (we ate lots of rye bread and pumpernickel along with featherweight bales of Wonder Bread for the kids), I grew up in an Italian-American neighborhood of New Haven and learned to love the torpedo-shaped loaves of Italian bread baked fresh daily all around the city.

I considered bagels too dense and not quite crunchy enough for good sandwich-making or meal accompaniment, and impossible to make a meatball sub with. To this day, given my druthers, I still prefer Italian or French bread as my household staple (and am profoundly envious of those who can masterfully bake it at home).

But as the bagel bakeries in Seattle began to proliferate, the virtues of the fresh bagel became not only omnipresent, but irresistible. I started making, no pun intended, the rounds.

Seattle has two large outside bagel chains: Noah's New York Bagels (which is headquartered in San Francisco, not New York) and Bruegger's, purchased in May by Quality Dining of Burlington, Vt.

Noah's was started in the Bay Area by a transplanted New Yorker, Noah Alper, in 1989. There are (as of this writing) eight Noah's outlets in the Seattle area, including some in the larger QFC stores. Noah's bagels are steamed, rather than boiled, which some purists feel make the bagel more tender and slightly puffy.

Bruegger's products are kettle-boiled (in a malt and water bath) and develop a pleasing bottom crust that almost resembles a fresh baguette, due to the slight amount of corn meal on their storage trays. At my last count there were 18 Bruegger's in the Seattle area with two more imminent. The company has more than 400 outlets nationally.

The biggest local bagel vendor is Bernie's Bagel's, with 11 stores and leases in hand for eight more, which are expected to open early in '97. The founder is Bernie Gordon, a former merchandising executive (from Pacific Linen and Jafco) who teamed up with veteran baker Daniel Levi Romero in early 1994. They are headquartered in Redmond.

"All of our bagels are made from a 100-year-old recipe. They are boiled," Gordon said, "not steamed. Then they are authentically hearth-baked, which we feel makes them a little chewier and a little crunchier."

Bernie's sandwich ingredients include home-made meatloaf, Boar's Head Meats and some outstanding light-smoked Atlantic salmon.

"It's done locally to our specs," Gordon said. "We don't like to divulge who smokes it for us (there are two companies) because we're afraid our competitors ... well, you know. But we try to avoid that leathery, over-smoked-salmon effect."

A smaller local company, but a very good one with a devoted following, is Bagel Oasis, with three stores. Peter Ryan first opened in the Ravenna neighborhood in October 1988. He had worked in various food industries while in college, and "mistakenly went into the world of business after I graduated. I hated it. My brother (Ken Ryan) had a place in Bellingham called the Bagelry. He taught me the fundamentals and here I am.

"Our procedures are pretty straight-up. We boil the bagels, just in water, and pay a lot of attention to fussing with the dough. To make sure it is just right. I started this not as a business, but because of a personal passion for food.

"And to keep myself employed."

Not all of the new bagel consumers are traditionalists.

"We have one customer," said a bemused counter woman at Bernie's Bagels on Green Lake, "who orders lox, cream cheese, onion and capers on a toasted bagel with chocolate chips."

Possibly the next fad. Maybe in 400 years.

(Copyright 1997, John Hinterberger. All rights reserved.)

John Hinterberger's restaurant and food columns appear in The Seattle Times in Sunday's Pacific Magazine and Thursday's Tempo. Harley Soltes is Pacific's staff photographer.