Last week, my dear friend Laurnie shared an article with me listing the “Best Bagels in San Francisco and the East Bay.” J. Kenji López-Alt, managing culinary director of Serious Eats, boldly claims that these bagels “aren't just good-for-the-Bay-Area, but would stand shoulder to shoulder with the best bagel shops in New York or Montreal.”
This claim strikes me as hyperbolic. I’ll admit that I’ve never been to Montreal, let alone had a Montreal-style bagel. I’m well versed in New Jersey bagels (they’re just as good as New York bagels, I promise), however, and hold every bagel I eat to those high standards.
I decided to visit the 20th Century Cafe, an adorable cafe in San Francisco’s trendy (read: expensive) Hayes Valley neighborhood, and home to what López-Alt considers some of the best bagels in the Bay Area. The Cafe, which I patronized on a beautiful Saturday morning with my visiting sister and a friend, was decidedly cute. The silverware was charmingly mismatched, and the shop was filled with delicate-looking cakes and pastries bathed in abundant natural light.
Determined to keep my eye on the prize and not be taken in by aesthetics, I ordered a poppy seed bagel sandwich containing cream cheese, smoked salmon, pickled shallots, and dill for $8.50. My sister, for the sake of variety (and a fear of lox) ordered an everything bagel with cream cheese, cucumber, avocado, and chives for $7.50. At the 20th Century Cafe an everything bagel means poppy seeds, flakes of sea salt, and, uniquely, nigella seeds.
When I learned about the Roman occupation of Britain in my 9th-grade Latin class, my brilliant late teacher told us that everyone says the same thing when they first see Stonehenge: “It’s smaller than I expected.”
These were the first words that came to mind as I looked at the almost charmingly small bagel in front of me. It was, like the rest of the cafe, cute. Cute, however, doesn’t cut through my Saturday morning hangover fog like a monstrous bacon egg and cheese does. Resisting the urge to eat the lovingly presented bagel in two bites, I ate slowly and analytically. The bagel was dark, dense, and chewy, sweeter than the East Coast bagels I was used to (explained by a “touch of honey” in the dough). The skin had a fairly satisfying crunch and texture, and the poppy seeds were, well, poppy seeds.
Overall, the sandwich tasted fine. Fine, unfortunately, does not cut it in this Great Bagel Race. The 20th Century Cafe’s bagel had a nice flavor (the pickled shallots were an especially notable touch), but lacked the authority and presence of a truly great bagel. I will likely visit the 20th Century Cafe again, but skip the bagel in favor of a peach pastry or their much-praised Russian honey cake.