Top spots to get a bagel in Philadelphia
Spread Bagelry, Schmear It and Bagels & Co made the list!
PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- Whether it's breakfast, lunch or dinner, it can always be bagel time! Here in Philly there are tons of spots to choose from, and I visited some of the best.
Spread Bagelry opened its doors eleven years ago, and now has a total of seven locations. The Rittenhouse store alone pumps out more than 5,000 sandwiches each week. Their bagels are Montreal style; boiled in honey water and baked in a wood-fired oven. They are slightly sweet, airy, and crispy all at the same time. I tried "The Cure." It's an onion bagel sandwich with brisket, bacon, egg, smoked cheddar cheese, and a sriracha spread. They have some healthier options too. I tasted their egg white sandwich with truffle mushrooms, spinach, light Swiss cheese, and turkey bacon. It was so good, I took the leftovers to go.
Schmear It has two city locations, and I stopped by the shop off of Market Street. Heads up though, they do things a little differently here. Each individual bagel has a scoop of cream cheese that's hand mixed with toppings and schmeared right on top. The menu has a stuffed French toast bagel with fresh strawberries, bananas, maple syrup, and walnuts folded into the cream cheese. Then there's the most popular, the "Loxsmith". It's a cream cheese scoop, chopped up lox, tomatoes, cucumbers, and scallions schmeared into your choice of bagel. The turkey avo was a great lunch option, with tomatoes and red onions smashed right into an avocado. I left with a Rival Brothers cold brew coffee with a homemade brown sugar cream.
Bagels & Co in Northern Liberties has mastered baking Brooklyn-style bagels and smothering them with any of their 15 flavors of cream cheese that they mix in house. They go through a minimum of 250 pounds of it each week! (For me, it was a tie between the bacon scallion and cucumber dill, but they have sweet options too!) The birthday cake cream cheese on a rainbow bagel was perfectly sugary, and the bacon egg and cheese on a French toast bagel had a yummy twist - a layer of crispy hash brown! But being from Philly, of course the Philly cheesesteak with grilled onions on a cheddar habanero bagel was my absolute favorite bagel of the day.
