Note: This shop is now closed.
On a visit to SS15 in 2012, I came across a stall selling, oddly enough in this part of town (if not the world), New York-style bagels. And what does one do when one comes across an unsuspecting bagel stall in Subang? One orders an onion bagel with cream cheese, because at the time, not only were bagels a rarity in KL, but the places that did serve them only had poppy seed bagels – if they weren’t serving doughnut-shaped bread pretending to be bagels.
And that onion and cream cheese bagel? It was the best I’d ever had – at least by my Malaysian-dreaming-of-going-to-America standards. I wanted big things to happen to this random bagel stall, because it was about time KL had a decent place for bagels.
Fast forward to the present, and that bagel stall (which I later learned was called Cham Bagel Bakery) is no more. Instead, it’s now BrooklynB, an actual café where the ring-shaped bread is the hero. Yay for bagels.
Here’s the thing you need to know about New York-style bagels: They’re meant to be thick, chewy and dense, and BrooklynB has this down pat. If you dine in, the bagels are toasted, resulting in a crunchy, slightly hard exterior some may not warm up to immediately, but it’s a texture I crave in a bagel, especially when paired with cream cheese or Nutella (which they let you do here).
When it comes to bagel sandwiches, lox with cream cheese is a classic combination, and BrooklynB does it well: generous slices of cured salmon and cream cheese topped with onions and capers in a poppy seed bagel. It’s the sort of sandwich I’d want for lunch five days a week. The café also does a breakfast fry-up (The Great NYC Breakfast) with scrambled eggs, mushrooms, sausages and crispy chicken ham with a buttered bagel on the side, but the dish I was served was a tad overseasoned and paled in comparison to the bagelwich.
As for snacks, the bagel chips (crispy oven-baked bagel slices served with aioli dip) is an addictive treat, but it’s really the NYC Buffalo wings that should win the award for BrooklynB’s best dish that’s not a bagel. The crispy, hot sauce-glazed wings packed a flavourful punch on their own that the accompanying aioli dip was left forgotten, and at RM9.90 for six pieces, you’re better off ordering a basket here than at any American family restaurant chain.
Since BrooklynB’s opening, bagels never really took off as a trend in KL, so it’s still about the only bagel joint of its kind in town. Maybe it’s not without its hits and misses, but if you’re here for the bagels (and Buffalo wings), you won’t be disappointed.