BANGKOK TRADER
MAY 2012 - 27
New York at Your Fingertips By Shei Sanchez
“There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home.” No ruby slippers were needed. No yellow brick roads were followed. As it happens, this is the place where gold is found at the end of the rainbow. This is the place where I found time and memory on a plate in front of me. I was transported – temporally and physically. It was a time capsule to New York City, and the bouquet of bagels and fresh deli meat goodness filled my senses to the brim. Looking at the blackboard with its neatly handwritten menu and then ogling at the buxom bagels before me, I had to remind myself that this is Bangkok. Yes, New York bagels in Bangkok! Act I: Backstage The wizard behind this hypnotic Big Apple-style bagel didn’t start off in the bread business. A former TV cameraman in Bangkok, Eric Seldin had been dreaming of that taste of home. It took him almost twenty years to make that dream into what has now become the best place to satisfy a bagel fix. Eric met a fellow foodie, and now co-owner, Tri Kanchanadul, via Twitter. The two gourmands began talking, and let lo and behold, the ideas immediately started to ferment. While visiting his hometown in upstate New York, Eric proceeded to scout locations. After a serendipitous find in Manhattan Valley in the Upper West Side, Eric’s research into what goes into a New York bagel was slowly, but so absolutely surely, coming to fruition. “It was family owned. They had every kind of bagel imaginable. They were baking on the premises, and they were hand-rolled.” After tasting this bakery’s goods, Eric realized this is more akin to what Thai gustatory buds can adapt to. Observing the long queues of expectant bagel-philes, Eric was reminded of a long-standing formula: “If it’s great, people will eat it.” More importantly, for New Yorkers, if the food is good, the food is damn worth going back to.
Act II: The test “If I was a consumer, what would I like?” – Eric’s inchoate notions began to pick up steam upon his return. Playing around with recipes and talking shop with professional bagel virtuosos, Eric and Tri discovered something even more fortuitous: They can source all their ingredients in Thailand. A bagel native expecting a New York-style product can come to Bangkok Bagel Bakery and have a true local experience. Of course, like with any business that originates with passion and perseverance, Bangkok Bagel Bakery relied on their knowledgeable customer base – “our American friends, people who spent time in New York, our most critical friends.” Admitting that they made textural blunders early on, from their customer comments and advice arose consistent batches. After training a hard-working Thai staff, and with a baker manager who carefully observed and learned from demonstrations, the perfect Bangkok Bagel was born. Needless to say, customer feedback and response was an indispensable part of this learning process. Continually building on the clientele interest, Eric readily responds to feedback. Act III: Bagels from... Bangkok! Originally, Eric envisioned a wholesale enterprise of just bagels. With the prime business district of Chidlom and its influx of foreigners and middle- to upperclass Thais, the potential of bagel buyers was high. Their official grand opening was March of last year. And clearly, it was grand. Their first chef was a sandwich expert from the East Coast of the United States. The expertise she brought to the business was more than just penning the original menu. She also named the sandwiches à la New York. “As opposed to a general Americanized style, the New York (style) separates us more,” Eric recounts. After all, many future clientele were from places who longed for that