St-Viateur Bagel

The narrow shop on Saint-Viateur Street lives on as a production facility: behind the working counter, dough rings are shaped by hand, boiled in water sweetened with honey, sprinkled with sesame or poppy seeds, and sent on wooden boards into the wood-fired oven. The family that now runs the business has opened other bakeries and cafés, while preserving the daily work by the fire here. The wooden boards by the oven and the fresh rings on the counter show that the old address has not turned into a stage set.

In nineteen sixty-two, fifteen-year-old Giuseppe "Joe" Morena came here to earn money. He intended to become an accountant. At the bakery, he was first assigned to carry firewood to the oven, then put to work making bagels on the night shift.

The owner was Myer Lewkowicz, a Polish Jew who survived the Buchenwald concentration camp. Later, he told schoolchildren that he had dreamed there of a piece of bread. In nineteen fifty-three, Lewkowicz arrived in Montreal and hired on with baker Hyman Seligman to learn the trade. Four years later, they opened their own shop on this street.

Lewkowicz called the new worker Yosl—that is the Yiddish form of the name Joe. There were many elderly Jewish customers, and the Italian Morena learned Yiddish while taking orders and working at the oven. Along with the language, he learned the entire production process: divide the dough, roll each strip into a ring, boil it in water sweetened with honey, coat it in sesame or poppy seeds, and send it on a wooden board into the wood-fired oven.

For several years, Lewkowicz urged Morena to join the business, but Morena held on to his intention of becoming an accountant. The decision came without a grand scene. One evening, Joe wanted bagels, made a dozen himself, and realized that he no longer wanted to leave the bakery. In nineteen seventy-four, he became a co-owner.

Myer Lewkowicz died in nineteen ninety-four. Morena continued the business with Marco Sblano, a longtime member of the team; later, Joe's three sons joined them. The family opened other bakeries and cafés, but the narrow shop on Saint-Viateur Street remained a production facility rather than a memorial address for its founder.

Behind the counter, they still shape the rings by hand, boil them in honey water, and bake them over wood. The firewood that fifteen-year-old Joe once carried to the oven is still needed here.