Al Brown gets misty eyed when he re-tells the story of when he first fell in love with bagels.
"I was on my first big OE and walking down a street in Montreal, backpack on, when I came across this bagel store. I stood mesmerised for a whole 20 minutes, just standing there watching them make these incredible things I'd not seen before. I bought a freshly baked bagel that day, just plain, and walked off eating it and thinking to myself that I'd like to bring the idea to New Zealand one day. But meantime, someone else brought the New York bagel concept to New Zealand and I thought I'd missed the boat."
That was more than 30 years ago but proving that Brown is a patient - and clever - man, he brings us his newest venture, Best Ugly Bagels, a workshop where he's churning out genuine, hand-built, wood-fired, Montreal-style bagels. He and his team trained in Montreal last year at Saint-Viateur, considered the spiritual home of the Montreal bagel.
"They're so different from their New York cousins - crispier on the outside, no added salt, so they're a little sweeter and lighter instead of being dense and doughy."
Best Ugly Bagels is situated in the cool hangout of the new City Works Depot and punters can drop in for a coffee while they watch the process of bagel-making - hand-rolling, boiling, then firing in the 15-tonne purpose-built stone oven - before having theirs toasted and slathered with whatever topping they choose.
