Wednesday, July 14, 2021

Not Bagel Bites, but Bite-Sized Bagels

Limited Edition Bantam Bagels
 - Lidl

Back in 2015 I attended the Summer Fancy Food Show in New York, and there was booth for Bantam Bagels in one of the many MANY rooms of the convention center. The brand rep was baking up these bite sized bagel morsels in a little toaster oven on the convention room floor, the booth operators were really friendly, and overall I had a really positive impression of the product and the brand, so much so that after seeing hundreds of products, I still remembered them all these years later. 
I felt a twinge of happiness seeing these in the freezer section, I'm glad to see they were picked up by a few grocery chains and were expanding into seasonal flavors. So I grabbed one of each to give them a try. 

The exterior is crisp, the inside is chewy, as far as bagels go, this is decent. I mean it's been frozen, thawed, and baked. It won't beat a fresh bakery bagel, but it's certainly more bagel-like than a Bagel Bite and pretty unique as far as bite-sized breakfast items go.

That said, the bagel base on both of these flavors are supposedly different, but I think they taste nearly identical. 

Pumpkin Pie: (orange filling): The texture is pretty dense, more like cheese cake than just normal cream cheese, and it has all the pumpkin spice flavor you'd expect. There is cinnamon, a hint of clove, nutmeg, and plenty of sweetness. If you've had pumpkin pie themed cream cheese, and you liked it, you'll like these. For me personally it's a bit too sweet and one-note for my tastes. I like it, but I don't love it. (Then again I haven't bought pumpkin pie cream cheese for myself in ages 'cause I'm sick of pumpkin, so I think this is all about personal preference). 


Cinnamon Bagel Exterior
: The bagel base is lightly sweet, but it's really hard to detect the cinnamon on it's own, it kind of tastes like an aftermath from the spiced filling. The combination of the two slightly reminds me of the pumpkin pie bagels we used to have at Panera, but due the the filling being real cream cheese, it's thankfully less dry.  

Apple Pie: (beige filling): This one has more of a thick cake frosting texture to me, not like the stuff in cans, more like the legit homemade stuff. It's sweet, but not as sweet as the pumpkin, and the cream cheese tanginess stands out more in this flavor, which I like. Other than that I get a healthy dose of cinnamon, which I love, and the apple comes as more of an after taste. Of the two, I actually like this one better. The flavor execution is a bit more complex, with the sweet, tangy, and spiced flavors working nicely together. Plus I really like that the apple flavoring comes from apple butter, so it has deeper, more caramelized, notes to it. 


Sweet Sugar Bagel Exterior:
 This was kind of a fancy name for what seemed to be a slightly sweeter than normal regular bagel. It was good, but it definitely needs the filling to keep things interesting. I also found myself craving raisins, but I am not sure how well raisins would work in the freeze-thaw-cook process. I also recognize that I am in the minority and that most consumers are raisin haters, but I think they would have made this seems a bit more complex and add some texture. 

Of the two, the apple was definitely my favorite, but we all know I burned myself out on pumpkin-everything years ago. So if you're not jaded to pumpkin spice, like I am these days, you'd probably be a lot more excited about those than I was.   

I liked these sweet flavors, but I am more of a savory breakfast person. I am not sure I would buy these particular flavors again, BUT I looked at their website and saw they offer an everything bagel with veggie cream cheese and THAT is right up my alley. I love veggie cream cheese. There is also a pretzel bagel with a cheddar Dijon cream cheese that sounds really interesting...so, like pretty much all foods, it's all about your personal preferences. I like the product, I like it's execution, but personally the sweet flavors aren't my jam. I look forward to getting the savory ones in the near future (it looks like they're at Wegman's) and I'll keep you posted.  


Fans of these would also like:
Everything Brioche Bagels, Panera Pumpkin Pie Bagel,
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