Ess-a-Bagel (108 W 32nd St)
Ess-a-Bagel keeps a counter on West 32nd between Sixth and Seventh, three blocks from the two bagel shops on 35th. The house bagel is the quarter-plate kind, faintly sweet, with the everything seeded edge to edge.
Why go
Bryan Kim reviewed Best Bagel & Coffee on 35th Street in June 2026 and opened by saying it doesn't even make the best bagels on 35th.
3 He gave the street to Liberty Bagels instead, the shop near Penn Station that keeps a bouncer on the door to manage its queue and sells birthday-cake cream cheese. Ess-a-Bagel is the old-guard option in that stretch, family-owned since 1976 and on the big faintly sweet side of the city's bagel argument. Apollo Bagels and Popup Bagels hold the tangy dense side of it.2 I have not found anything written about this particular counter.
Order this / avoid
- Order: the everything with scallion cream cheese, which is the build both guides describe.2
- Avoid: treating a guide entry as a review of this door. Both guides tasted First Avenue.
What locals & experts say
- The Infatuation's bagel guide, on the Ess-a-Bagel bake, written about the First Avenue original:
highly consistent, slightly sweet, quarter plate-sized bagels,
and an everything thattakes scallion cream cheese like a champ.
2 - Bryan Kim, The Infatuation, June 2026, on the neighbors: Best Bagel & Coffee
doesn't even make the best bagels on 35th. There's some stiff competition over at Liberty.
3
Good to know
- The doors: seven, including 770 and 831 Third Avenue, 115 Broadway, the Upper West Side, Time Out Market in Brooklyn and Newark Airport.1
- Booking: none.
Verdict
could-visit — The only evidence pinned to this address is the operator's own structured data, which proves the door is live and gives the cross streets. Everything about the bake was tasted at the First Avenue original, so it is brand evidence wearing a door's name. What the row can add is the neighborhood ranking: Bryan Kim put Liberty Bagels ahead of Best Bagel & Coffee on 35th Street in June 2026. That gives somebody off a train at Penn three named shops in an order rather than one.