Bagel Market: A Quickie Review

image: BrownstonerSo, despite my La Bagel loyalties, I thought I owed it to you guys to drag my fat ass over to Bagel Market this weekend to try shit out at their grand opening.

The traditionalist in me wanted to hate them...but I just couldn't. I mean, I didn't totally love them either, but we're officially in like.

Here's the good:

*Big variety of bagels, including mini, flat and all the regular players.
*gigantic deli counter selection with like 72 different types of cream cheese. Now again, I'm pretty much just a straight up scallion cream cheese gal, but for those of you that like strawberrry cinammon raisin cappuccino twist cream cheese, you're in luck.
*Beyond the cream cheese, they have homemade hummos (at least it looked like it), whitefish salad, egg salad, etc. I tried the egg salad, and it was pretty good.
*They also have other bkfst items you can order, like pancakes!
*I'm pretty sure that they have the same exact fresh OJ machine as La Bayg (cause they make it right in front of you), BUT La Bagel chills their fresh OJ after its made and it *does* make a big diff.
*The place looks nice, everyone who works there is nice, and no one screams at you.

The not so good:

*I didn't really love the bagels. They look nice, but I just didn't think that they held up to La Bagel by comparison. Also, I'm a total poppy seed girl, and Bagel Market's poppy seed bagels have this bizarro sweet taste to them that srsly bummed me out. They're also TOO seedy. But yeah...just wasn't feelin the bagel as much as LB.
*The baked goods looked kind of meh to me. Now, in fairness: I didn't really try much. They have a glass case full of muffins and cookies, but nothing looked super appealing. And no black and white cookies! I did get Greg this chocolate brownie cake thing and he pretty much just moaned the whole way through eating it, so I think that was good.
*They didn't have avocado. I mean, not tragic, but with such a great deli counter, would be nice to have those sandwich extras that we all dig.

All in all, I liked it way more than I thought I would. Everyone there could not have been nicer, and also it kind of rocks to have a spot to sit down if you feel like it. Personally, I think I will be hitting it up more as a lunch spot than as a morning bagel spot, but who knows.

Did you guys try it? What did you think??

p.s. I'm a total fucking moron and took no photos.