Not long ago, I was at Maple St. Cafe, one of our longtime favorite restaurants, and I noticed growth in the little restaurant row on that street. It is really quite the restaurant row: Cote Sud, Satsuma Cafe, Jamila’s, Chez Delachaise, Cafe Fresca, Maple St. Cafe, and Burger Nerds, and that's not all. A bagel place called Shug’s Bagels recently popped up next to Hot Stuff, (hopefully the last of Mason Hereford’s forgettable restaurants.)
I have always loved bagels, but we have not had a lot of good ones here. My current favorite is Flour Moon, but even those are not as good as a long gone place on Causeway in Metairie that is now a car parts store. That closing was a heartbreaker.
The arrival of Shug’s interested me because I am ever on the lookout for this New York staple. This location so near to Tulane University is perfect placement because of the high population of students from the Tri-State area. Shug’s is obviously a chain, but not out of New York. Its few other locations are all in Dallas, but it definitely looks like New York inside.
A visit to Shug’s is daunting, just like hanging out in New York. A lot of decisions are required and they have to be made quickly. And there are lots of people here. The menu stresses me too. A lot of different categories of options splotched on the page, no prices, and an endless amount of choices.
Forgive me this obvious blasphemy, but I am not a fan of bagel sandwiches. They are having “a moment.” There were 15 choices of bagels or bread for building this sandwich, and 11 choices of cream cheeses, including vegan, for your bagel. Whew!
Even though I actually had a game plan before approaching the counter, questions from the guy behind it stressed me. He was patient and accommodating, but just the number of decisions was overwhelming. I was glad the usual long lines at the counter were not there when we ordered.
I picked up a crumb cake by the register, and I had an order for a plain bagel and an everything bagel. Those were the easy things. My friend got a drink and a turkey club sandwich. We were exhausted trying to decide what bread to choose. She defaulted to an everything bagel. And she subbed out the jalapeño mayo for pesto.
I had my own issues to contend with. There was at first no “bowl” for my breakfast bowl, and then they found one. I got scrambled eggs and cheese, bacon, and a “hashbrown.” With no prices on the menu, we had no idea what this would cost, but I felt it might be within a certain realm that was familiar. It was $46 for a breakfast bowl, a bagel sandwich, two individual bagels, a crumb cake square, and a drink.
My breakfast bowl looked like play food, except for a generous portion of what turned out to be good bacon. It was thick and of good quality. The cheese and eggs were mixed, making one indistinguishable from the other in appearance and taste. And the hashbrown made the one at McDonald’s look appealing.
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There was nothing to make me want to eat the hashbrown past the first bite. The bacon was good, and the eggs and cheese were fine, so the breakfast bowl was okay.
The sandwich was delicious. I will go back there and order one of those myself. It was lightly “griddled,” which means it had heat applied but just for a minute, leaving the interior room temp. The Cheddar cheese was soft. There was plenty of turkey sliced to the right thickness, some avocado, delicious tomatoes, lettuce, and more of that very good bacon done stiff. And the pesto really perked it up a notch. On the everything bagel, all of those separate flavors came together in a really pleasing way. I only got a few bites of this because it was not my sandwich, but I loved it.
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After vexing over the various cream cheese options at the counter, I settled on jalapeño and regular cream cheese. They give you so much of these I’m glad I said yes when he offered to do half of each.
I had half of the everything bagel with the cream cheese. The jalapeño was way too spicy. These are very thick bagels with a lot of heft to them. I could hardly finish half of this one. It’s a very dense bagel, which I like, but I would still say I prefer Flour Moon Bagels. These are good, though.
The crumb cake didn’t make much of an impression. Very dense and heavily dusted with powdered sugar, there wasn’t anything wrong with this if you like dessert. It was quite sweet, which is not to my taste, but it seemed to be a basic crumb cake.
I like the feel of this place. If you are intrigued by New York culture, here is a taste of the vibe. It is full of young people from Tulane, which I’m sure gives them a taste of home. And if you are in the neighborhood, it’s a fine place to have a good bagel.
