Can I find a good Seattle bagel at... Sully Eats
Is there a good bagel lurking underneath Fremont Bridge?
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 make sure I review any specific bagels (or want to let me know why I’m wrong), you can email me at seanmatthewkeeley@gmail.com.
Fremont was my first home in Seattle, so I have a lot of fondness for the Center of the Universe.
I spent many of those early days camped out with my laptop on the deck at Fremont Coffee Company or tucked away inside Gypsy Cafe (R.I.P. ) on Stone Way. On the weekend, a stroll through the Fremont Sunday Market was required. Even if I’d already seen the same tchotchkes and handmade items fifteen times before, it was always a vibrant scene. Plus, I’d get to say hi to so many dogs.
Back in the day, my go-to Fremont Market meal was a slice of Veraci Pizza out of their wood-fired oven. But recently I found out that there are bagels, bialys, and babkas available on the regular. It seemed only appropriate to visit my old haunt to find out more.
Samm Hess and Kenny Barnes, two chefs with extensive restaurant and kitchen experience, started Sully Eats in April 2023 with a mission of “filling bellies, leaving smiles, and embracing community with action!” More specifically, they started a food business that specializes in bagel sandwiches, babkas, and bialys.
“We met many years ago at a catering company and have remained dear friends ever since,” wrote Hess in an August 2023 Instagram post. “After a couple years of casual chit-chat, we decided that we should take the dive and try bringing our flavors and love to a new concept, hence the birth of Sully Eats. We make babkas, bialys and sandos. Traditional is not our style, we like to have fun and sometimes like to get weird but that’s where the magic happens!”
The duo often collaborates with Aaron’s Bagels and it’s not uncommon to see each bagel purveyor show up in one another’s social media posts or at their market booths. And in a very brief amount of time, they’ve created a groundswell of support and hype from their bagel sandwiches and other items.
Sully Eats has popped up in several markets and businesses around Seattle, but you’re most likely to find them at Fremont Sunday Market at the moment. So that’s what I did.
Let’s find out how the bagels behind those sandos stack up.
And if you want to know how I define a good bagel, you can find that here.
WHAT I ORDERED
Everything bagel with chive cream cheese ($5.00)
Plain bagel as-is ($2.75)
THE EXPERIENCE
I was a bit confused when I rolled up to the Fremont Sunday Market a little after 10:00 a.m. and found 34th Street empty. I’m also apparently the last to know that they move under the Fremont Bridge in the winter. It’s quite a different market under there, and I wasn’t feeling it at first, but I quickly came around to appreciate the flea market vibes, especially with the classic Seattle overcast skies completing the atmosphere.
I found Sully Eats in the “food court” area of the market and the booth was as advertised, featuring bagels, bialys, and babka. I didn’t snag a slice of babka but they looked really good. I saw their bialys referred to somewhere as “Jewish breakfast pizza” and that seemed like a very apt description as they were much bigger and loaded than traditional bialys.
As for the bagels, they kept things simple. Flavor options were plain, sesame, and everything while the schmear selections were plain, chive, and jalapeno popper. While I’m certainly intrigued by that last one, I stuck to the usual order for the purposes of the review. In general, the menu was definitely sandwich-focused, with breakfast and lunch options.
And I should say that Kenny and Samm were friendly and delightful at the booth while schmoozing the crowd and working the grill. Coupled with the solid Seattle bagel prices, it made for a nice ordering experience.
UPON FIRST GLANCE
Based on my internet sleuthing, it looks like they make their own bialys and babka but the bagels appear to come from a different source. They have said previously that Loxsmith was their bagel supplier, but these didn’t appear to be Loxsmith bagels to me. If anything, they more closely resembled Aaron’s Bagels, especially the everything.
TOP
The top of the plain bagel was a light golden brown and featured some good-looking texture points and blisters. It was extremely firm to the touch with plenty of crinkles. The bagel itself was a good size and appeared to be a tight roll.
It’s worth noting that they automatically “toast” bagels on a griddle for all sandwich and schmear orders. I got the plain bagel without that.
Meanwhile, the top of the everything bagel was a nice golden brown. There was a strong seed hand here featuring the black sesame seeds that I love to see. I didn’t detect any salt in the mix, so that was something to keep an eye on. The bagel was soft on top, perhaps due to being warmed on that griddle.
BOTTOM
The bottom of the plain bagel was a little softer than the top but still very firm. A very minimal Cornmeal Ring of Doom (CRoD) was detected. Meanwhile, the bottom of the everything bagel was also softer than the top. That bottom was very well-seeded, which I always appreciate.
INSIDE/BITE
I should note that all of the bagels came pre-sliced, probably because most people order sandwiches and aren’t some weirdo like me. But I wish it had come without the slice, especially as some moisture had gotten in there and made the interior a little soggy in spots. The plain bagel was an extremely tough rip, which tipped me off to think these were made the day prior. The bite was soft, bready, and tough. It quickly became clear this bagel was meant to be a sandwich distribution system, not to be eaten on its own.
Even though the everything bagel had been toasted, it also ate a little stale. The exterior was soft with no crunch while the interior was very doughy with a medium rebound after each bite. The seasoning mix did indeed lack salt, which muted the overall flavor. The cream cheese, which was extremely gooey due to the high-heat toasting, had a slight chive flavor but I wanted more. To be fair, the schmear surprisingly didn’t gloop out of the bagel as much as I expected it to.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I see what Sully Eats is doing here. They’re about the sandwich experience, featuring hand-held meals that you can’t help but snap some photos of before devouring. And it looks like they’re very good at it.
The purpose of my newsletter doesn’t intersect well with that mission, so I have to give them some grace here. That said, while it seems like they put a lot of love into the bialys and babka, I hope that, as they grow, they commit more to making the bagels stand on their own and not just as a pastrami or bacon delivery system.
Is It Good Enough For The Goys?
The line at Sully Eats formed pretty quickly that morning and I even had one person come up to me while I was eating to ask where I got the bagels from, so I would say the goyim are all-in. I think these guys are actually very complimentary to a place like Salmonberry Goods, and it would be an interesting litmus test to see which Sunday market bagel sandwich the goyim in your life prefers.
Is It Good Enough For Northeastern Jews?
When I say those babka slices looked good, I was not kidding. And some of those bagel sandwiches sounded pretty appealing. So my review aside, I would encourage anyone to check them out and see for themselves. The bialy certainly treads the boundary of what you might consider a bialy, but if it tastes good, it tastes good. Who are we to argue?
MY SEATTLE BAGEL RANKINGS SO FAR (2/18/24)
Old Salt (Fremont]
Old Salt (Ballard)
Loxsmith (West Seattle)
Loxsmith (Beacon Hill)
Sully Eats
Westman’s (Capitol Hill)
Westman’s (U District)
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