‘Crusty’ and ‘Pillowy’: How N.Y.C.-Style Bagels Made It Big in London

“What’s an ‘everything bagel?’”

It’s a question that Georgia Fenwick-Gomez, a co-owner of Papo’s Bagels in the East London neighborhood of Dalston, hears a lot, as customers stare blankly at a menu with words including “schmear,” “scallion” and “lox.”

Papo’s is part of a wave of new shops in Britain selling New York-style bagels, distinct for being bigger, doughier and more heavily seasoned than their London counterparts. The shops have prompted both curiosity and innovation, adding to London’s long history of bagels — or “beigels,” as they were originally known here.

Many of the new shops have similar stories: During the coronavirus pandemic lockdowns, homesick New Yorkers in London started experimenting with bagel baking at home. Ms. Fenwick-Gomez and Gabriel “Papo” Gomez, the other co-owner of Papo’s, moved to England from New York in 2018.Once the pandemic hit, Mr. Gomez, missing New York and dreaming of bagels, started watching bagel-making videos on YouTube and testing out recipes.

Another bagel connoisseur, Francesca Goldhill, of London, spent hours in her mother’s kitchen trying to find a recipe that produced bagels similar to those from Brooklyn Bagel, her favorite when she lived in New York. She opened Bagels + Schmear in Hertfordshire, outside London, in 2022.

Dan Martensen, a former New Yorker, opened It’s Bagels! in Primrose Hill last year, after experimenting in his kitchen during the pandemic to try to satisfy his cravings for a bagel that reminded him of home, with a “crusty, flavorful shell and a pillowy inside.”

Rinkoff Bakery in East London, which opened in 1911.Credit…Mary Turner for The New York Times