siegel's bagels

this place is the real deal - a hidden gem. authentic wood fired bagels, the owner hails from montreal where he grew up working in a bagel shop. this is a family owned joint with their main location in kitsilano open 24 hours, located in the mini strip mall on cornwall just after the burrard street bridge. the bagels are fantastic. smaller and denser than what you might be used to, they are healthier too! they have tons of great bagel flavours, from rosemary rocksalt to sesame pumpernickel and wholewheat blueberry and more. their chocolate walnut rugolach is the best in town. their cream cheese is delicious and all low-fat. they make the bagels in-house with a big brick wood fire oven and they don't add preservatives, they keep the ingredients simple and whole. a great place to stop on your way to kits beach to pack a lunch or snack with you. they have daily deals and breakfast specials all the time, plus you can buy ingredients like lox, cream cheese and adozenbagels and take home. just awesome.

one late night after a workout, i came to siegals because it was probably going to be filling but also more importantly because it's opened 24/7. i tried both the montreal smoked meat bagel and the lox and cream cheese(? the salmon one). both were great, with a nice bite and chew the bagels were baked to perfection. the cream cheese and salmons was very satisfying and i enjoyed it over the montreal one, the smoked meat one was more heavy and salty but the mustard gave it a great kick. i also bought adozenbagels and ended up freezing them for whenever i needed a quick breakfast, i recommend doing this if you are in a crunch breakfast. i would recommend this place if you're ever craving a bagel.

just visited and had been charged for adozenday old's instead of one bagel and now find thedozenbagels i did ask for are poppy seed instead of sesame seed that i had asked for, i guess i will have to really watch closely when ordering here

dull, stale and tasteless. out of adozenbagels, i got six that had seen their freshness ooze out of them some days ago. not a great batting average. service was poor with the counter staff on dope or suffering from severe attention deficit disorder -- she was slow, and i had to repeat the order three times. definitely not the best in vancouver as they boast. (get a life and go to solly's.) and anyway you can only get montreal bagels in montreal -- it's the water, stupid (ours soft water and theirs hard), and it makes all the diff in da world. a try at the granville island location was also disappointing: sticky gluten with a hole in the centre does not a bagel make. (sad the owners have to get their friends to say how great this place is: it isn't ... at all.)

the only place for bagels in vancouver. joel got it right following some old traditional methods used in montreal...and infused some new ingredients as well, try the rosemary & rock salt bagel...awesome, just don't eat 1/2dozenor you'll need a gallon of water! a little pricey though for the smoked meat sandwich...just wish it was bigger like schwartz' in mtl...go tuesdays for the discount for a dozen...

let go my siegel's bagels!. the first time i had a siegel's bagel, i fell in love. they were still sold at costco at the time and after the first bite, my family and i were hooked. then they stopped selling to costco, and so we begrudgingly settled for other kinds of bagels, until we found out about the granville island location. even then, siegel's became a once-in-a-while treat. i've since moved away from vancouver, but every time i go back (about once a year) or every time someone visits us in the states, my only request is siegel's from granville island. usually i get about 2dozenbrought to me: i eat 6 in the first 2 days (luckily they are low fat!), then freeze the rest and savor them for the next few months. now that i've turned my two toddlers onto siegel's though, i have to fight them for my bagel. sometimes i try to give them another brand while i havce my siegel, but they always call me out on it. i wish siegel's ship to the us (or ship anywhere at all!)...i would totally pay the s/h for it!