What St-Viateur Bagel is known for
Holocaust survivor Myer Lewkowicz opened St-Viateur in Montreal's Mile End on 21 May 1957, one of the city's first bagel shops; after his death, longtime employee Joe Morena bought the business and kept the original recipe unchanged. Dough is still hand-rolled, boiled in honey-water and wood-fired in a stone oven at the flagship and its other Montreal locations, with bagels shipped across North America.
Myer Lewkowicz, a Holocaust survivor who arrived in Canada in 1953, opened St-Viateur Bagel in Montreal's Mile End neighborhood on 21 May 1957, one of the city's first dedicated bagel shops. After his death, Joe Morena, an Italian immigrant who had worked at the bakery for years, bought the business and kept Lewkowicz's recipe and process unchanged.
That process is what distinguishes the Montreal bagel from its New York counterpart: dough is hand-rolled by feel, briefly proofed, boiled in honey-sweetened water, then baked in a wood-fired stone oven that gives the crust its characteristic char and the bagel its sweeter, denser bite. The technique has not been mechanized since 1957.
St-Viateur has grown to seven locations across Montreal, from the original Mile End flagship, open around the clock, to newer cafés in Laval, Anjou and Dollard-Des Ormeaux, and now ships its hand-rolled, wood-fired bagels across North America.
How ORBIS reads this city
Best for — The original 1957 hand-rolled, honey-boiled, wood-fired Montreal bagel
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