I want you to picture a very specific kind of
morning anxiety. Oh, I think I know where this
is going. Yeah, you probably do. So it's Saturday
morning. You are standing in a line that wraps
all the way around the block. Right. You can
smell the yeast, the sugar, that distinct hot
dough smell of a classic New York style bakery.
Best smell in the world. It really is. And you
finally get to the front of the line. The person
behind the counter is holding the tongs, looking
at you with absolutely zero patience. Naturally.
And you just freeze. Bakery paralysis. It happens
to the best of us. Right. Because you look at
the poppy seed and you think, well, that's too
simple. You look at the sesame and you're like
too boring. You look at the garlic and you think,
I have a meeting later. I really can't smell
like a vampire today. You want all of it, but
you have to pick one. Exactly. It is a high -stakes
decision for 9 a .m. It's the classic paradox
of choice, you know? When you're presented with
five genuinely good options, the fear of missing
out the FOMO just kicks in hard. Oh, completely.
You don't want to commit to the salt bagel because
you're already mourning the loss of the onion
bagel. Which is exactly why, for the indecisive
and the greedy among us, and I definitely include
myself in that category, there is a savior. The
ultimate cheat code. The cheat code of the bakery
world, the everything bagel. Yes. Today, we are
not just talking about a breakfast food. We're
doing a deep dive into how a pile of bakery trash,
and I mean, that literally became the defining
flavor of a generation. It really is a wild trajectory.
It is. And just to give you an overview of where
we're pulling all this from, our deep dive today
is based on a really fascinating collection of
sources. We've gone through Wikipedia archives,
deep cut culinary articles, historical bakery
records. And we are on a mission. to unpack how
this happened because we're going to look at
the science of why this specific combination
of seeds hits our brains like a drug. Oh, yeah.
We're also getting into the surprisingly vicious
legal and historical battle over who actually
invented it. So much drama. And finally, how
it ended up as a literal symbol of nihilism in
an Oscar winning movie. It's a fascinating case
study in what we call culinary convergence. You
know how multiple people often stumble upon the
exact same great idea at the exact same time.
Nihilism and cream cheese. Just a perfect Saturday.
Truly. So let's just start with the basics here.
I feel like we take the everything bagel for
granted. It's just you know the one with the
stuff on it. Right. But our sources for this
deep dive suggest that the actual definition
is pretty rigid. It is surprisingly strict. If
you look at the culinary archives, and everything
bagel isn't just a random assortment of whatever
happens to be in the pantry. A very specific
chemical balance. And a key point here, it is
strictly about the toppings, the crust. Meaning
you can't stuff it with jalapenos and cheddar
and call it an everything bagel. Correct. Everything
is the exoskeleton. It has nothing to do with
the fillings. Interesting. And the canonical
list of ingredients is actually a master class
in flavor layering. Okay, lay it out for me.
You start with the base, which is your standard
wheat dough, boiled and baked. Wait! Then you
have the aromatics. That's the garlic flakes
and the onion flakes. Okay, stop right there
for a second, because I have always wondered
this. What's that? Why flakes? Why not fresh
garlic? If I'm making pasta or chicken, I use
fresh garlic. Why are we using this dehydrated
stuff that looks like fish food? That is a great
question, and it really comes down to the science
of the bake. Okay. Think about it. If you put
fresh minced garlic or raw onion on the outside
of a piece of dough and threw it in a 500 degree
commercial oven, what happens? Well, it burns.
It incinerates. It turns bitter and acrid almost
instantly. Yeah. But the dehydrated flakes, they
are fascinating. Oh, so. They start out bone
dry. Yeah. All right. But as the bagel bakes,
the dough itself releases steam. Oh, I see. So
those flakes actually rehydrate slightly from
the steam of the bread while simultaneously toasting
on the outside from the ambient heat of the oven.
That is so clever. It creates that very specific,
chewy, crunchy texture that you just cannot get
with fresh vegetables. It's a savory umami bomb
that is chemically distinct from fresh garlic.
So it's basically reanimating the garlic. In
a way, yeah. You're bringing it back to life
with bread steam. I love that. Then, moving down
the list, you have the seeds. Poppy and sesame.
Right. And this isn't just for decoration. Sesame
adds oil and nuttiness to the flavor profile.
And the poppy. Poppy adds that earthy, slightly
bitter crunch that inevitably gets stuck in your
teeth. The little souvenir you take with you
for the rest of the day. Unfortunately, yes.
you'll be picking that out at 3 p .m. Always.
Then you have the coarse kosher salt. Crucial,
absolutely crucial. It's the flavor amplifier.
Yeah. It literally wakes up the receptors on
your tongue so you can actually taste the garlic
in the onion. Okay, so that's dough, garlic,
onion, poppy, sesame, salt. Right, but then...
So there we go. Then there is the controversial
one. The ingredient that I bet 50 % of our listener
don't even realize is there, and the other 50
% actively hate. I was reading the ingredient
list in the source material, and I actually had
to go to my kitchen and double check my own pantry.
It is the dark horse of the bagel world. You
are talking about caraway seeds. Caraway. Now,
I only know caraway from exactly one place. Rye
bread. Exactly, rye bread. The stuff you use
for a Reuben sandwich, it tastes like, kind of
like licorice or innis. Yeah, it has a compound
in it called carvone. It's very distinct, very
polarizing. It is what... gives rye bread that
unmistakable rye taste. But in the original 1970s,
everything bagel, caraway, was a non -negotiable
element. But why? It seems like it would clash
horribly with the garlic and the onion. You would
think so, but think about what you usually put
on a bagel. Green cheese. Exactly. Fatty, rich,
heavy cream cheese. Caraway acts as a cut. Oh,
interesting. That sharp, slightly minty licorice
flavor cuts right through the fat of the dairy
and cleanses the palate. So you don't just get
bogged down in the heaviness. Exactly. It prevents
the bagel from just tasting like a heavy lump
of dough and grease. So it's functional architecture.
It's load -bearing flavor. It really is. But
because it is so polarizing, a lot of modern
supermarket versions, you know, ones you buy
in the plastic sleeves, they quietly remove it.
No way. Yeah. They don't think the mass consumer
can handle the caraway. They're dumbing down
our bagels. They are streamlining them for sure.
Yeah. But if you go to an authentic old school
New York bagel shop, the caraway is usually still
there fighting for its life against the onion.
I am definitely checking for caraway next time.
You should. OK, so we have this perfect chemical
weapon of a breakfast food. The Voltron of carbs.
Yes. But where did it actually come from? Because
this is where the story gets really messy. Very
messy. You'd think someone just accidentally
dropped a plain bagel into a bin of mixed seeds
and went, oops, well, let's bake it anyway. Right.
But apparently people are fiercely fighting over
this legacy. Oh, it is a full blown custody battle
in the culinary world. I love it. We have multiple
claimants, inconsistent timelines, and some very
bruised egos. And the geography for all of this
is highly specific. Where are we talking? We
are talking exclusively about the Jewish bakery
scene in New York and Long Island in the 1970s
and 80s. OK, let's meet the contestants. In the
red corner, we have a guy we'll call the teenager.
That would be Brandon Steiner. Right. Now. You
might actually know that name. He became a huge
sports marketing mogul much later in life. Oh,
the Steiner Sports Guy. Exactly. But back in
1973, he was just a 14 -year -old care, working
the night shift at a bakery in Brooklyn. I just
love the image of a 14 -year -old being given
free rein in a commercial bakery overnight. That
feels very 1973. Different times. Very much so.
Just like, here kid, watch the ovens, try not
to burn the burro down. Pretty much. And Steiner's
story is essentially one of boredom. Which is
the mother of invention. Truly. He claims he
was just screwing around. He was making braids,
making onion flats, just testing the limits of
the dough to pass the time. And one night, he
has a light bulb moment. He says, and I'm quoting
his own blog post directly here, I had the thought
to throw all the toppings on a bagel at once.
That's how I invented the everything bagel. So
it's the maximalist approach. Just why choose
one flavor when I can literally have them all?
It's a deliberate artistic creation in his mind.
Exactly. He positions himself as a genuine inventor,
a culinary disruptor, basically. OK, I buy that.
Kids do weird stuff with food. They do. But then
in the blue corner, we have a story that is much
less flattering. Yes. This is the one that frankly
kind of grosses me out. It's a little rough.
This is the story of David Gusson. Right, David
Gusson. Now his claim dates to around 1980, so
a bit later than Steiner's. Okay, seven years
later. He was working at a bagel shop in Howard
Beach, Queens. And his story isn't about artistic
inspiration at all. It's about cleaning up. He
was the sweeper, right? He was. Now you have
to picture the inside of these huge industrial
bakeries. They have these massive tunnel ovens
where the bagels travel through on conveyor belts.
Like a car wash for bread. Exactly. And as they
bake, seeds fall off, burnt onions fall off,
salt falls off. Right. And it all just accumulates
at the bottom of the oven over the course of
the day. It's debris. It's charred bakery dandruff.
Well, Guson calls it sweepings. Sweepings. He
was literally sweeping out the oven. And instead
of throwing this huge mix of burnt seeds into
the trash, he scooped it all into a bin. OK,
hold on. I really need to pause here for a second.
Go ahead. Are you seriously telling me that the
most popular bagel flavor in America, the one
I willingly pay extra for, is literally based
on the concept of eating trash? Trash is a very
harsh word. Let's call it reclaimed resources.
It's floor sweepings. Oven floor. Is there a
difference? Yes. It's sterile. It's been sitting
at 500 degrees all day. I guess that's true.
But yes, Gustin's claim is that he took this
bin to the owner and suggested, hey, why don't
we roll some fresh dough in this bin of leftovers
and sell it? Pure profit. Exactly. And the most
crucial part of his claim is that he says he
coined the name Everything Bagel right then and
there. See, this is the difference between marketing
and reality. How so? If he had called it the
trash bin bagel or the sweepings bagel, it never
would have taken off. Oh, absolutely not. Dead
on arrival. But calling it everything sounds
abundant. Right. And Guson is adamant about this.
He actually admits that other people might have
mixed seeds together before he did. OK. But he
explicitly insists that he invented the name.
To him, the branding is the actual invention.
Okay, so we have the artist Steiner in 73 and
the sweeper Gusson in 80. Yes. It feels like
a classic he said he said situation. And usually
in these historical deep dives, we just have
to shrug and say, well, we'll never know for
sure. Yes, it's last time. Yeah. But this time
we have a smoking gun. I love a good smoking
gun. Or a smoking toaster in this case. Nice.
Our sources dug up a newspaper column. from Newsday,
which is a big Long Island paper. And this article
is dated January 19th, 1977. OK, let's look at
the timeline here. Steiner is 73. Guson is 80.
This article is 77. Smack in the middle. Interesting.
What does it say? The article is a dining review
of a place called Bagel Master in Siset, New
York. OK. and the writer explicitly mentions
a bagel designed for, and I'll quote this directly,
those who can never decide if they want plain,
salt, poppy seed, sesame seed, garlic, or onion.
Okay, that describes the exact problem we talked
about earlier. Right, and then the article says,
quote, there's something called the everything
bagel, which is topped with all of them. Oh.
Something called the Everything Bagel. Yes. That's
definitive. It's right there in print. It proves,
without a shadow of a doubt, that the name and
the concept were already public knowledge and
being sold commercially three full years before
David Gusson claims to have invented the name.
So sorry, David Gusson, but the timeline just
doesn't work for your story. It really doesn't.
But wait, does that mean Steiner is the definitive
winner then? Because 73 is before 77? Not necessarily.
because there are actually other claimants too.
Really? Who else? Well, the marketing guru Seth
Godin claims on his blog that he worked in a
bagel factory producing them two years before
Guson. Okay. And even Joe Bastianich. The famous
restaurateur. The very same. Yeah. He has thrown
his hat in the ring as a potential inventor.
Though our sources note that his claim is highly
disputed. This is wild. It's like everyone wants
to be the father of the everything bagel. But
our expert synthesis of all these sources suggests
something else entirely. Which is? The theory
of culinary convergence. Culinary convergence.
Right. The idea that maybe the exact date, whether
it's 73, 77, or 80, matters a lot less than the
geography and the culture. OK. Break that down
for me. Think about the environment in New York
and Long Island at that time. You have hundreds
of independent Jewish bakeries all operating
in the same area. They all have the exact same
five or six ingredients sitting in bins right
next to each other on the prep tables. Yeah.
And they all have the same indecisive customers.
And I'm guessing they all have that same thriftiness,
right? Exactly. This is deeply rooted in Ashkenazi
Jewish baking culture. OK. This is a culture
born from generations of scarcity and hardship
in Eastern Europe. which was then brought to
the tenements of New York City. You do not waste
food. You never throw things away. You make kugel
out of leftover noodles. You make matzo brie.
You make croutons out of stale bread. So the
idea of sweeping up leftover seeds and finding
a way to sell them? It wasn't just one genius
guy having a eureka moment. Right. It was probably
happening in 50 different bakery basements at
the exact same time. That makes so much sense.
Everything bagel was just inevitable. It was
destiny in dough form. The ingredients wanted
to be together. It just took a few decades for
us to realize we could market it. So it starts
as this hyper local way to save money on seeds
in the 1970s. Right. But then as we get into
the modern era, something really weird happens.
The flavor escapes the bagel. It completely goes
rogue. It does. It stopped being just a bread
topping and became a standalone seasoning category.
I remember seeing this shift happen in real time.
First it was bagel chips, which makes total sense.
That's literally just a hard sliced bagel. Logical
extension. But then, I mean, have you walked
down the snack aisle of a Trader Joe's lately?
Oh, it's out of control. It is everywhere. We
have everything bagel dip, everything bagel mixed
nuts. Pasta. OK, we need to address the crimes,
though. The crimes. Because there are culinary
crimes being committed in the name of this seasoning.
I was at a trendy coffee shop the other day,
and I saw an everything croissant. Ah, yes. The
fusion pastry. It felt deeply wrong to me. Why?
A croissant's about butter, right? It's about
delicacy, laminating the dough, the flaky layers.
It's French. True. Putting pungent, rehydrated
garlic and onion on a delicate croissant. Isn't
that basically a declaration of war against France?
It might be considered a hostile act in Paris,
yes. But from a purely flavor perspective, it
actually makes a lot of sense. Explain yourself.
Think about the profile. A croissant is basically
just fat and simple carbs. Right. Everything
seasoning provides the coarse salt. and the sharp,
savory punch that cuts through all that butter.
Like the caraway. Exactly, like the caraway.
It's the exact same principle as the bagel, just
using a much flakier vehicle. I still say it
feels aggressive, but I think the ultimate decoupling
of the flavor from the bread is the jar. The
shaker jars. Yeah. You can just buy the seasoning
by itself now. That was the massive game changer.
Once you could buy a little glass jar of everything
but the bagel seasoning, the bagel itself became
totally irrelevant. Which is crazy to think about.
It is. But you could put it on avocado toast,
on fried eggs, on popcorn. We collectively realized
that we didn't actually want the 400 calories
of dense bread. We just wanted the salt and the
garlic. We wanted the dopamine hit of the seasoning
without the chew. That is so true. But this massive
commercialization, this idea that everything
can literally be on everything. It leads us to
a really fascinating pop culture moment. Yes,
it does. Because the everything bagel isn't just
a snack anymore. Recently, it became a profound
metaphor. We have to talk about that movie. We
do. Everything, everywhere, all at once. The
2022 Oscar winner. If you haven't seen it, first
of all, Pause this deep dive and go watch it
immediately. Highly recommend. But the central
plot device of this massive sci -fi multiverse
movie is, of all things, a bagel. And everything
bagel. But the villain of the movie, Jobu Dupaki.
She takes the name completely literally. Right.
She doesn't just put poppy seeds and coarse salt
on it. No, she puts literally everything on it.
Every thought, every dimension. Old report cards,
dog breeds, Craigslist ads, hopes, dreams, receipts.
All of it. And the result in the film is that
the bagel becomes so dense that it collapses
in on itself and creates a literal black hole.
It becomes this ultimate symbol of total nihilism.
The character's core philosophy is if you put
everything on a bagel, then nothing matters.
The weight of it destroys meaning. It's pure
sensory overload. Yes. Which honestly, if you
think about it, brings us full circle right back
to that feeling in the bakery line. It really
does. It's a brilliant critique of modern life.
We currently have access to everything, right?
All the time. All the information, all the streaming
content, all the global flavors all at once.
And instead of making us incredibly happy and
fulfilled, it sometimes just feels like a black
hole. It's paralyzing. It feels like nothing
matters because there's just too much of it to
process. That is incredibly deep for a conversation
that literally started with onions on an oven
floor. I think that's the genuine power of food
history. Everything bagel started as a humble,
practical solution to scarcity. You know, let's
use up these scraps so we don't lose money. And
now, 50 years later, it has evolved into a symbol
of overwhelming excess. We have too much and
we're frantically trying to consume it all in
one single bite. It went from waste not want
not to just everything all the time. Exactly.
And I think that is ultimately why it endures
as a flavor. It speaks directly to that part
of human nature that just wants it all. We are
greedy. We are. We don't want to choose. We don't
want to sacrifice the savory onion just to get
the salty crunch. We want the full maximalist
experience, even if it leaves us with terrible
breath and poppy seeds stuck in our teeth. So
true. All right. So let's wrap this up. We have
gone from the chemistry of rehydrated garlic
flakes to the disputed sweepings of David Gusson
all the way to the philosophy of the multiverse.
A journey. Truly. What is the big takeaway for
you from all these sources? For me, it's really
about the value of looking at everyday things
differently. How so? Well, whether it was Brandon
Steiner playing around on the night shift or
David Gusson sweeping the floor or some anonymous
baker in Seacet, they all looked at a pile of
separate totally standard ingredients and saw
something greater than the sum of his parts.
Right. They saw synergy in the chaos. And they
created an icon out of leftovers. It's the ultimate
culinary remix. It is. Innovation isn't always
about inventing a brand new molecule in a lab.
Sometimes it's just about taking what is already
on the table or on the floor and mixing it together
in a way no one else has quite dared to do yet.
I love that. Which actually brings me to a final
thought for our listeners to mull over today.
Let's hear it. Next time you're feeling indecisive
or you feel like your skills or your interests
are just completely all over the place, maybe
your accountant who also loves death metal and
community gardening, don't try to separate them.
Don't force yourself to pick the plain bagel.
Exactly. Look at the leftovers of your own lives.
The random hobbies, the weird disconnected skills,
the things that don't seem to fit together on
paper. Maybe, just maybe, if you throw them all
into one pot and give it a catchy name, you're
not making a mess. You're making an everything
bagel. And that, I think, is a recipe for success.
Thanks for diving in with us today. Now go brush
your teeth. See you next time.