Photograph by Kathy De La Torre

Seriously into bagels are Posh Bagel employees (from left) Epigmenio Cerqueda, Jose Lopez and Jill Cronk.

Many tasty morsels come from the Posh Bagel ovens

By Suzanne Cristallo

The first recorded reference to beygls was in 1610, when officials in Krakow, Poland, posted regulations stating that bagels should be given as gifts to any woman in childbirth. Although modern women might appreciate such rewards on similarly momentous occasions, the consumption of bagels today is practiced by many Americans on a daily basis.

The qualities of the ring-shaped yeast roll with the chewy texture and shiny crust have long been known on the East Coast, where they are a staple of Jewish delicatessens and bakeries. More recently, however, bagels have surpassed the doughnut as a favorite snack of many Los Gatans.

"We have regulars--a surprising number of them are dads who come in with their babies in strollers during the week," observes Betsy Fowler, acting manager of The Posh Bagel on W. Main Street in Los Gatos. "Some are so regular that the staff merely has to look up and see who it is, and they know what order to prepare."

Regulars keep the store busy between 6 and 8 a.m. Another surge in business comes with the 10 a.m. coffee break and another at 11:45 a.m. with the high-school lunch rush.

"Asiagos are the most popular [order]," Fowler notes, referring to an onion bagel with rich, nutty-flavored Italian cheese on top, baked until it becomes crusty. Teens like it stuffed with cream cheese. Kids, on the other hand, favor chocolate-chip mini bagels, scaled down in size to accommodate small mouths.

The Posh Bagel also serves breakfast bagels filled with scrambled eggs and ham or cheese. Onion, blueberry, sesame and whole wheat bagels are also available, as are plenty of cream cheese "schmears" to go with them. The tomato basil, veggie, lox, walnut raisin, garlic herb and spinach dill schmears are all rich in flavor and low in fat.

The staff creates its bagels by dropping the shaped dough into in boiling water, which reduces the starch and creates a chewy crust. The bagels are then baked. It is the baking process that absorbed the founders and owners of The Posh Bagel long before they went retail in Los Altos in 1992.

Jeff Ottoveggio of the "San Jose Italian family" and Chilean-born Sergio Donoso started their career together selling baking systems to bakeries all over the country, including corporate giant Noah's Bagels. Knowing they could be successful baking their own bagels, they made Santa Clara their headquarters and founded The Posh Bagel.

The Los Gatos shop opened in 1993, seven months after the flagship Los Altos store, and was followed by one in Oakland and another in Menlo Park. Besides the four stores owned by Ottoveggio and Donoso, the pair has franchised the operation to six others in Northern California. Additionally, they operate a wholesale bakery from a warehouse in Santa Clara, where 25,000 bagels are baked each day.

Each Posh Bagel shop, however, bakes its own bagels. In Los Gatos, The process starts each day at 5 a.m., when bakers Jesus Luna and Sergio Garcia fire up the ovens.

Fowler--who jokes that the career which brought her to this area 30 years ago was that of "a stewardess in the days before flight attendants"--is serving as the store's manager until the position can be filled permanently. She is acutely aware of customers' needs, and she applies the skills she learned in her airline days and those gained operating her own catering business to her work. Next year, she will start a new job: designing a take-away menu for each Posh shop. Look for carry-out salads and entrees to be added soon to the soups, sandwiches and yogurt already served alongside Posh's bagels.

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The Posh Bagel, 125 W. Main St., Los Gatos. Open Mon.-Sat., 6 a.m.-4 p.m., and Sun., 7 a.m.-4 p.m. 408.395.1386.

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