Bagels by Jarrett

Even before Bagels by Jarrett was the belle of the World Cup ball — supplying pizzas to the Spanish and Norwegian teams staying at the MC Hotel in Montclair — we had been wanting to tackle his absolutely enormous menu. Though The Hipsters already have their local go-to bagel shop, so we were most likely not going to hoof it over to his shop for boiled dough rings. Frankly, I was kind of intimidated by the schizophrenic menu and the seemingly oddball ordering mechanism, but that’s just my anxiety around being the household person solely responsible for securing grub for three other hungry-ass eaters. As opposed to hungry ass-eaters. Which is honestly the only thing Jarrett doesn’t have on his menu.

Before we get to the food, let’s address a couple things. The name of this place is officially Bagels by Jarrett. But it seems even Jarrett has gotten tired of that pretty awful name and just gone with BXJ. It’s on his signage and his website… But, just the way I’d love for people to call me Spike, they’re still just gonna call me what they want to call me. It’s just one of the many things that feels a bit ADD about the whole endeavor. Now, if I were to have started this business (and, oddly, I had a preview of it way before it actually came to fruition because of a coincidental connection to Jarrett pre-BXJ though Ms. Hipster), I would have — I don’t know — gone with the obvious and called it Seltzer Bagels. Seltzer being Jarrett’s last name. And, if you’re in any way familiar with Jewish delis and whatnot, you’ll know that seltzer plays a large part in their history and lore. It was right there! The second thing is the whole ordering and pickup process. BXJ is takeout-only. I’m not certain if this was always the vision, or if opening and operating during COVID changed the plan. But you order online, drive up the store, a young woman walks out of a “do not enter” door in the mini-mall parking lot, walks over to your car and asks your name. She vanishes back through the “do not enter” door and you just kind of sit there assuming she’ll emerge at some point. The app that told you pickup was at X time not really updating or telling you anything other than the fact it’s fifteen minutes past the time it told you to show up. Meanwhile, there is another set of doors that go into the “slice shop” where you can maybe also place orders if you haven’t pre-ordered? But you also don’t go into unless you’re ordering a takeout slice or placing an in-person order of anything on the menu on a self-service kiosk. It’s not soup Nazi level weirdness, but it’s still a little weird the first time out.

Now, the food. I will say this: if you have a picky family or a group of folks who all feel like something different, this is your place. The menu is verging on obscene. It has everything on it. Like an insane number of things that seems almost like a joke. Or a challenge. Presumably this predicated the shift from the original name to BXJ, because this joint is only two percent bagels at this point. Everything from Chinese to Italian to Mexican to burgers. And of course pizza and sandwiches. Honestly, that barely begins to describe the bonkers panoply of cuisines and items on the list. So I scrolled and scrolled, not really sure what to do. Could he possibly have the ingredients for all these thing on hand? Much in the same way I wonder who orders the lobster thermidor at the local diner, I was curious if I could find the most obscure thing on the menu just to see if he could pull it off. But I pussed out and just went with a $17 chicken cutlet stromboli (with the free option to add ricotta).

Now, if you dig back through my reviews from the early 2000s (which were more likely actually from the late 90s, but I switched platforms and the dates go all messed up), you’ll see that once upon a time I was quite the chicken roll connoisseur. It was my drunk food. It was my sober food. As far as I was concerned, it was food. And this, my friends, is a chicken roll. It’s basically pizza crust wrapped around a chopped chicken cutlet with some mozzarella and a little ricotta. Almost a perfect food. The thing weighed about eight pounds, was the size of a dachshund puppy and came with your typical side of marinara sauce. All in all it was pretty tasty (and dense), but would pretty much hit just over the median of my thirty-year chicken roll experience flavor-wise. The second half heated up well day two and was plenty for a satisfying lunch. Ms. Hipster got the $25 eggplant parm, which was a really weird choice for her. Not being the biggest fan of eggplant and all. What arrived was the largest pile of fried eggplant anyone has ever seen, on top of some garlicky noodles. I think she was overwhelmed and kinda bailed. However, I ate her leftovers a couple days later and found it really tasty. But, even with a head start, I couldn’t down the incredible amount of eggplant (pause). It was like they got a bulk deal on nightshades or something. The noodles were a little funky reheated, but I appreciate the attempt at making “creamy” noodles. Hipster Jr. got $20 Buffalo wings (12) that he said were “not bad,” but were definitely not Buffalo wings. He said they were sweet. And he ordered some fries that he roundly rejected, but I found not terrible — though certainly not something I ever needed again. Hipster Jr. Jr. got an $18 “roundish” bar pie. I’m not a bar pie guy, sorry. Especially a bar pie that is walked out in a rain storm and driven 15 – 20 minutes in a cardboard box, sits on a counter for another five and then is slowly eaten over another half hour. They just don’t travel well, regardless of the quality. I didn’t taste it, but it looked… kinda stiff and on the dry side. But she seemed okay with it, so I’ll call it a win. I’m just not sure this was the pie to represent NJ to the world, of that’s what he sent over to the European football players. But, hey you can’t have everything. But for $105 all-in you can have quite a bit of food, and what amounts to boundless choices from just about everything.

451 Mt. Pleasant Ave. – West Orange
973/250-6155
bagelsbyjarrett.com