Ess-A-Wrap for Beloved Bagel Shop

Photograph by Angela N./Flickr
For bagel lovers, there’s going to be a hole on Manhattan’s east side — but not for long. After nearly 40 years of bagel-baking and nosh-slinging, Ess-A-Bagel will close its Gramercy location, on 21st Street and 1st Avenue, at the end of January.
But — hold the schmear — another bagelry is moving in. Manhattan upstart Tal Bagels will share the newly divided space with a Bank of America branch.
Manhattan neighborhood blog Town and Village broke the news about the beloved Ess-A-Bagel, which has earned a fierce following for its boiled bagels since its 1976 debut.
As recently as last week, owner David Wilpon — whose aunt, Florence Wilpon, founded the business — was holding out hope that he might stay. “There’s a lot that’s up in the air,” he told Town and Village. But the landlord has confirmed the new tenants, according to the Daily News.
A true neighborhood spot as haimish as its name, Ess-A-Bagel routinely made “Best-Of” lists; CBS Local went as far as to anoint it New York City’s reigning bagel shop. “Ess-a-Bagel is hands-down considered to have the best bagel in NYC,” the site enthused. “They’re enormous, tough-skinned, dense almost to the point of breadiness and have a malty kick.” The site also praised Ess-A-Bagel’s much-loved smoked fish, rice pudding and other staples.
Even the sometimes-snarky Gothamist gave it up for Ess-A-Bagel in a ranking of New York’s ten best bagel shops. “Some claim Ess-A-Bagel’s offerings are too big,” the site wrote. “We beg to differ, and will continue to indulge in a crispy, colossal everything bagel loaded with scallion cream cheese, lox and tomato.”
Will Tal Bagels be able to live up to that kind of rep? Based on online reviews, it looks iffy. “The plain bagel was a true gutbomb. It had a toasty crunch without being warm. My first bite gave way to a slight sweetness and malty flavor that reminded me of a dense biscuit. This one veered on the edge of being too well done,” carped the EatThisNY blog, which rated Tal Bagels 7 out of 10.
Meanwhile, Ess-A-Bagel’s landlord is blaming their tenant for the lease snafu.
A statement from Wilpon’s landlord, an outfit called East 21 Retail LLC, claimed that “we’ve bent over backwards to come to a mutually fair agreement with Ess-A-Bagel’s owners. Our offer would have allowed Ess-A-Bagel to remain — and even gave them the option to expand — in the space they are in currently. Unfortunately, it takes two sides to make a deal, and Ess-A-Bagel’s owners repeatedly refused to meet us between their below-market rent and current market value.”
The closing leaves one Ess-A-Bagel location, in East Midtown.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Most Popular
- 1
Film & TV What Gal Gadot has said about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- 2
News A Jewish Republican and Muslim Democrat are suddenly in a tight race for a special seat in Congress
- 3
Fast Forward The NCAA men’s Final Four has 3 Jewish coaches
- 4
Culture How two Jewish names — Kohen and Mira — are dividing red and blue states
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward ‘Another Jewish warrior’: Fine wins special election for U.S. House seat
-
Fast Forward A Chicagoan wanted to protest Elon Musk — and put a swastika sticker on a Jewish man’s Tesla
-
Fast Forward NY attorney general orders car wash to stop ripping off Jews with antisemitic ‘Passover special’
-
Fast Forward Cory Booker proclaims, ‘Hineni’ — I am here — 19 hours into anti-Trump Senate speech
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.