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Anyone who wandered past a familiar stretch of Broadway this weekend got an unwelcome surprise: a dark storefront and a bright Department of Health notice taped to the glass. It is the latest Upper West Side bagel shop to run afoul of the city’s inspectors, and this one did not go quietly. The violation sheet the city left behind is one of the worst the neighborhood has seen in a long time, and the number at the top of it is hard to believe.
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The shop is Tal Bagels, the longtime counter at 2446 Broadway, between West 90th and 91st streets. The Health Department shut it down following an inspection on July 17; when inspectors tallied the damage, they left Tal Bagels with 157 violation points, and the city’s own grading math shows just how ugly that figure is.Since 2010, the Health Department has scored every restaurant inspection on a points system where lower is better, then turned the score into the letter grade posted in the window. A score of 0 to 13 points earns an A, 14 to 27 points lands a B, and 28 or more points means a C, the lowest grade the city hands out. Roughly nine in ten city restaurants carry an A at any given time, so even a B in the window tends to stand out. A full shutdown is a separate and more serious step, one the city takes when inspectors find conditions that pose what they call an imminent public health hazard. Tal Bagels’ 157 points is a C many times over, more than five times the score that triggers the city’s worst grade.
The number also towers over the scores that have shuttered other Upper West Side bagel and appetizing shops in recent memory. It is more than twice the 76 points behind Bagel Talk’s 2024 closure, more than twice the 67 points that ended Absolute Bagels the same year, and more than three times the 51 points that briefly closed Barney Greengrass in 2019.
The report reads like a list of nearly everything a bagel lover would rather not picture. Inspectors flagged evidence of mice, live roaches, and filth flies, the full pest trifecta, across the shop’s food and non-food areas. They cited food preparation areas contaminated by sewage or liquid waste, along with a sewage disposal system that was improper or inadequate. Hot foods were being held below 140 degrees and cold foods above 41 degrees, right in the range where bacteria multiply. The rest of the sheet included food that was adulterated, contaminated, or cross-contaminated, a handwashing station that was missing or unusable, no Food Protection Certificate on hand for a manager or supervisor, inadequate personal cleanliness among staff, and food left unprotected from contamination during storage and prep. Twelve of the violations were flagged in red as the most serious of the bunch.
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To reopen, Tal Bagels will have to pass a follow-up Health Department inspection confirming that the problems have been corrected. As of publication, the Broadway location remained closed. The shutdown affects only that shop. Tal Bagels operates several other locations around Manhattan that are not part of this closure.ILTUWS called Tal Bagels for comment ahead of publication. Here’s the full report.
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