Can I get a good Gig Harbor bagel at... B's Bagels & Butters
Take me down to the Maritime City...
Welcome to It’s A Shanda, one Northeastern Jew’s quest to find a decent bagel in Seattle (and beyond). If you’re interested in taking this journey with me, make sure you subscribe so you never miss a review. If you want to ensure I review any specific bagels (or want to let me know why I’m wrong), you can email me at seanmatthewkeeley@gmail.com.
It was a long and winding road to Gig Harbor for B’s Bagels & Butters owner Brittany Erwin.
“I personally have been dreaming of bagels since I moved to Washington in 2016,” she wrote in the Kickstarter campaign for her bagel shop. “Coming from New England, I was used to bagel shops on every corner with warm crunchy cream cheesy goodness (including the one I worked at during college). There were a couple bagel places in Tacoma around that time, but they quickly disappeared leaving me hungry and craving a great bagel.”
Along with almost 16 years of experience working in restaurants, including a stint in college working at a bagel shop, Erwin was driven by that craving to bring some bagels to Tacoma. She started by offering bagels for pick-up through Instagram with the hopes of finding a brick-and-mortar location in the city.
“I kept finding myself wanting to eat a bagel and I couldn’t find a place in the area where I could get one,” Erwin told The News Tribune. “I knew I wanted them, but so does everyone else in the area. The demand is definitely there.”
When that location didn’t work out, she set her sights across the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. A space with a small kitchen in Gig Harbor was available and, in 2021, she decided to make that her spot with plans to open within six months.
“People who love bagels,” said Erwin in 2021, “are determined.”
Starting a small business comes with all kinds of challenges and it wasn’t until March of 2023 when doors finally opened on B’s Bagels & Butters.
“It’s been a long time coming,” Erwin said in December 2022. “The nervousness has worn off and it’s now all excitement.”
The goal? To bring some East Coast-style bagels to the West Coast.
“Our East Coast-style bagels will be New York style, just without the New York water,” Erwin said. “Still chewy, crunchy, and salty.”
When you think of bastions of bagel hype, you probably don’t think of Gig Harbor. Yet, right from the jump, lines have been out the door and the hype hasn’t dissipated yet.
“The lines on weekends are absolutely crazy,” Erwin told Gig Harbor Now, noting that demand forced them to quickly grow from 350-400 bagels a day to 650. While they feature all of the classic flavors, you’re also apt to find unique flavors month-by-month, including beetroot rye, pumpkin, spinach, and Thai chili black sesame.
The Butters aspect of the name comes from Erwin’s homemade compound butters, which range from garlic herb to candied pecan to honey butter.
“A compound butter is a flavored butter generally used as a topping, spread, sauce,” Erwin said. “They can be savory or sweet.”
The bagels, as they tend to do, remain the stars of the show. And even now in August 2023, you’re still likely to wait in line whenever you arrive at B’s.
So how do the bagels live up to the hype? Let’s find out.
And if you want to know how I define a good bagel, you can find that here.
WHAT I ORDERED
Plain bagel as-is
Everything bagel with scallion cream cheese.
THE EXPERIENCE
Keeping an eye on B’s from a distance, it’s been pretty clear that they have a penchant for long lines and selling out. Hence, I decided to make an early morning pilgrimage to be safe. Sure enough, arriving around 9:20 a.m., there’s a line out the door about 12 people deep. Based on photos I’ve seen on social media, that’s on the short side. I noted that the “Sold Out” placard has been placed in the corner, ready to be revealed whenever needed (though B’s mentioned a couple of months ago that they rarely sell out anymore).
It’s an extremely cute space. A converted garage space with bright colors and a vibrant vibe inside. This isn’t the classic deli but it’s also not trying to be. The menu boasts all of the classics but also features some pretty out-there flavor profiles. The special of the day is a Thai chili sesame bagel with pineapple cream cheese, sliced cucumber, chili crisp, and pea sprouts. There’s also an option to get “birthday cake cream cheese.”
Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Secaucus anymore.
I do take note of an egg bagel, something I’ve received a lot of requests to find in the Seattle area. They’re pretty hard to come by so if you need your egg bagel fix, here you go.
UPON FIRST GLANCE
Visually perusing the baskets I see that these look like some pretty hefty-sized bagels. They seem to have a height to them, which tends to imply we’re in for some fluffy softness inside. The doughy look and feel also implies we might be working with something softer on the exterior as well.
TOP
Starting with the plain bagel, which is indeed big and doughy. The top does have some crispness to it, but instead of crackling when I push on it, it deflates and then rebounds. The color is a good golden brown and there are a lot of blisters and crevices around the top and sides.
As for the everything bagel, we’ve got a strong seed hand here. I do notice that there’s a dust of some kind mixed in with the seeding. Potentially salt? There’s a firmness that comes from rapping on the top of the bagel though it seems to have a lot to do with the onion and garlic, which have cooked well to form a kind of crust.
BOTTOM
Both bagel bottoms were extremely soft, much more so than the tops. It felt to me like I was touching the bottom of a roll rather than a bagel. There’s something of a cornmeal ring of doom but that’s not always a bad thing. You can definitely notice that the consistency of the shape changes between the two bagels when you compare the bottoms.
INSIDE/BITE
Ripping into the plain bagel, I note a slight crispness. The ample and fluffy interior gives off a very bready smell. Biting into it, I don’t get any crunch and it tastes very much like I’m eating bread. The interior is extremely pillowy and clearly offers a lot of potential structure for schmears and sandwiches. Left to its own devices, however, there isn’t much taste to be found.
The everything bagel comes with an extremely hefty serving of scallion cream cheese. They also toasted or warmed the bagel, which made me concerned since the cream cheese wasn’t cold. I figured that I would be dealing with some spillage when I bit into it. Turns out, it was more like a dam breaking.
I lost arguably 50% of the cream cheese inside the bagel after one bite, much of it all over my hands. Along with the schmear spillage, I was left with a bagel that had been warmed on the outside but not the inside, leading to a mushy chew. The bagel also collapsed on the bite, which was very different from the plain.
I detected an interesting flavor in the everything bagel seeding. Something spicy that I couldn’t put my finger on. I was also pretty sure that the dust was salt, which didn’t quite mesh with the rest of the seed mix. My personal preference would be for a coarser salt to balance things.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Unfortunately, I have to say B’s Bagels aren’t my thing. While I came away feeling like I’d eaten a bread product, it wasn’t the one I’d been expecting. If it looks like a roll, smells like a roll, and tastes like a roll…
Is It Good Enough For The Goys?
Is it ever! B’s has consistently drawn lines out the door and seems to have rave reviews from the locals. Who am I to tell them they’re wrong? Ultimately, it’s great to see a place like Gig Harbor get its own local bagel shop. The more popular bagel shops around the region, the better.
Is It Good Enough For Northeastern Jews?
I think you know the answer to this one already. But like I said, I’m hopeful that Erwin and her team can continue to thrive. And hey, if you really need to scratch that egg bagel itch, you can always make the trek from Seattle to satisfy that.
MY SEATTLE BAGEL RANKINGS SO FAR (8/27/23)
OUTSIDE SEATTLE BAGEL RANKINGS
The Bagelry (Bellingham)
Howdy Bagel (Tacoma)
Coquette Bake Shop (Bainbridge Island)
Otherside Bagel Co. (Bellingham)
Whidbey Island Bagel Factory (Mt. Vernon, Whidbey Island)
B’s Bagels & Butters (Gig Harbor)
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