The Brief

L.A. has never really been known as a bagel town.

Sure, you could always pick up a decent dozen from a bagel chain to bring to a brunch, or get a quick egg and cheese bagel sandwich to gobble down as you guzzle your hazelnut roast, but we haven’t historically had a “bagel culture” here in the same way that New York City has.

Now, we're in the midst of our own boiled-then-baked-ring-o’savory-dough boom with self-made bagel mavens single-mindedly focused on achieving artisanal excellence. Even New York's local rag is acknowledging California's bagel scene as the reigning champ.

We talked to three bagel shops about L.A.'s bagel renaissance: Belle's Delicatessen & Bar, which has been in the game since 2012, Hank’s Bagels, which blew up in 2019 a few months before the pandemic shutdowns, and newcomer Daniel’s Bagels, whose baker is a recent college grad who opened a shop over the summer.

L.A. style

According to Sam Silverman, New York City’s “Bagel Ambassador” who consults with start-up bagel shops across the world, “in L.A. there tends to be a much bigger emphasis on the presentation and overall experience, than just the food itself.”

Silverman says that in N.Y. bagels are optimized for convenience — closed sandwiches that you can take on the go.

“There is not an expectation for long lines, with equally relaxed atmospheres, and beautiful open-face sandwiches," he says. "The aesthetics are more Instagrammable.”

His theory for why bagels have blown up? The internet. “It has democratized information,” he said.

Bagel making was once limited to the closely held trade secrets of members of New York’s International Bagel Bakers Union Local 338. Now it can be figured out by anyone, “there’s been this explosion of interest everywhere,” he added.

Hank’s bagels (Burbank, Sherman Oaks, Calabasas)

Before he and his wife Kelly opened Hank’s bagels in 2019, Trevor Faris had a background that could be called bagel-adjacent. He’d been baking with sourdough, as a cook in other kitchens. He'd even perfected a focaccia recipe, and briefly worked in the beer industry.

When the opportunity to lease a pinhole-sized restaurant space a block from Bob's Big Boy in Burbank came up, they envisioned a sort of focaccia-forward sandwich shop.

But after the first week it was clear that they were destined to become a very popular bagel shop. They'd open their doors at 8 a.m. and be sold out by 10 a.m. The people of Burbank really wanted bagels!

Hank's in Burbank

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Courtesy Hank's Bagels

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After the pandemic struck, four months after opening, they had to pivot to deliveries. But orders kept coming in and they needed to find a bigger kitchen.

So exactly one year after opening the Burbank location they opened in Sherman Oaks. Then they built a counter and opened to the public in January 2021, with a Calabasas location in 2023.

They now also have a food truck for catering, which pops up at The Platform in Culver City on Fridays and Saturdays.

The secret to making a great bagel: 

Faris has a quick answer. “TIME," he said emphatically. "You have to be willing to take the time to develop dough."

Their fermentation process takes three days. Day one is the sourdough starter, Day two is the mix, and Day three is proof and boil.

He also puts a lot of time into his business. Trevor said he’s “100% in the shop, 7 days a week.” But when we spoke he was getting ready to take a three-day trip to celebrate his wife’s birthday, their first vacation since opening the shop in 2019.

Belle’s bagels (Highland Park)

Nick Schreiber co-founded Belle's Bagels with his high school buddy J.D. Rocchio, as a pop-up in 2012 "before pop-ups were pop-ups".

While living together in Highland Park after college, they began to reminisce about their favorite childhood bagel shops: Sam’s on Larchmont, The Bagel Broker, and, of course, I & Joy Bagels. They wondered why nobody was opening these kinds of places that were so dear to them.

Nick had some experience cooking, so he said, “Sure, I can make us bagels,” which evolved into an "Underground Brunch." They invited some friends, but kept the Eventbrite public — and "somehow two or three hundred people showed up in our backyard."

They became obsessed with making their ideal bagel, watching YouTube clips, and going frame by frame to learn about techniques, and factory setups.

They also developed friendships with other new school bakers, and spent a weekend in 2012 at Beauty’s Bagels in Oakland.

"We got to hang out with Blake and Amy, the first California bagel revivalists, for a weekend," he remembered. "They were so giving with their knowledge."

Their first official pop-up was in 2014 in the back of La Perla panaderia in Highland Park. They cooked during off-hours (midnight-5 a.m.) and would sell out quickly. Their customers said it helped fill the void of bagel shops in the Highland Park area.

Nick Schreiber and J.D. Rocchio, (L-R), co-founders of Belle's Bagels

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Haven Kim

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They initially moved into the York Blvd concert venue, The Hi-Hat, and later moved across the street, first doing take out and then turning it into the Jewish deli of their dreams.

They showcase local purveyors like RC Provisions (who makes everyone's pastrami), with a nod to those Jewish delis they loved eating at in their youth like Art’s, or Nate 'n Al's, or Greenblatts, but with their own fun decor (tchotchkes and family photos) and their distinct sense of humor (the Mezcal Tov cocktail).

At the end of the day, he said, it somehow comes back to “Are you doing this for yourself or for other people?" "Does this serve a purpose? Is this contributing to the neighborhood at all?”

The secret to making a great bagel:

A great bagel must have "textural contrast”, he said, “a good crust, and a little fluff and a little chew.”

He loves bagels that "still derive sweetness from barley malt syrup,” which is used in beer making and baking, and is the signature sweetener of a New York-style bagel. "If you need a frame — it's Grape Nuts. That's what I look for."

Schreiber said their style is hard to describe — "it's more of an emotion than anything.” They took what they liked most about bagels and put it into one.

"We're just trying to make the food the grandma would make with a full sleeve of tats and septum piercing," Schreiber said.

Daniel’s Bagels (Palms)

Daniel Messinger of Daniel's Bagels started dabbling in bagel production while still a student at U.C. Santa Barbara. When the pandemic lockdown canceled classes in 2020, Messinger moved home to Northridge. Not being able to leave the house, he spent a lot of time reading online recipes and watching YouTube videos about bagels — adjusting, adapting and perfecting his bagel recipe.

He started to bring these bagels to family and friends, and thought, "Well, maybe this could be a business." After graduating college in 2022, he started to bring his products to farmers markets, and worked from a commercial kitchen, and partnered with his brother Ben, who works in marketing, to help grow the company.

Daniel Messinger of Daniel's bagels

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Harper Point Photography

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For Messinger the ideal bagel is "nice and crispy outside, very soft, fluffy inside. We do smaller bagels — no bagels as big as your head. We're on the rip-and-dip smaller side of things."

In June, they opened their first brick and mortar in Palms. “The response has been great,” he said. “We've become part of a lot of people's routines. Walk over, get some bagels."

Daniel's makes between 1,000 and 1,500 bagels on their busiest days

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Harper Point Photography

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“In the first few weeks we were selling out early, so we had to compensate, just keeping up with the capacity limits and finding a way to add more staff," he added.

Now, on their busiest days they make between 1,000 and 1,500 bagels.

The secret to making a great bagel:

Messinger said “to make a bagel doesn't require a crazy amount of knowledge. But to make a really good bagel takes a lot of practice and trial and error".

At this point he estimates he’s made hundreds of thousands of bagels. "It doesn't get easier. There are all these changing variables. If X is happening, how do you adjust the variables to compensate?"

Recently the weather has been very dry, "so we are trying to keep dough from drying out.”

Topline:

Why now: Making, Keeping, and Losing Friends author McCabe joined LAist’s AirTalk with Larry Mantle to share her friend-making advice with listeners, and we heard from listeners on how they make friends.

The local angle: With geography, jobs and traffic all making the act of “hanging out” a challenge, listeners shared their friend-catching tips.

Matt in Eagle Rock said, “It takes two people to make that friendship work; you have to put the effort into it. That is the harder part as you get older. I started in an adult dodgeball league, which I had never done in my life. Now I’ve been doing comedy, it's really about getting to know the people.”

Priyanka in Orange chimed in, "As I have grown older and moved from college in training for so-called adult life, it’s become harder to find friends that you find relatable and who are as invested in the friendship as you yourself are. The new thing I have discovered is Bumble for friends… and so far it's been a good experience.”

Sydney in Koreatown said, “Transitioning from a gay male to a transwoman, I have lost some friends from transitioning, but I have also gained some deeper friendships. It has been a profound and absolutely amazing experience finding common ground, and finding other gay males that support my transition, and finding other trans women that I have a deepening relationship with too.”

Raul in Long Beach also weighed in, saying, “You don't need social media. No matter what anyone says, it really is not necessary to meet new people. When you’re not on it, it motivates you to talk to people in person, it commits your attention to them face to face.”

Listen to the full segment to hear McCabe’s advice on finding and maintaining friends.

Laura Terry dreamed of having kids — a family she could call her own. But there was one challenge: She wasn't interested in dating, marriage, or partnering up.

So, she came up with an idea for an unusual present to give herself.

"For my 39th birthday, I bought a vial of donor sperm," says Terry, who lives in Nashville, Tenn., and works at a top management consulting firm.

She started the process of having a baby via in vitro fertilization, or IVF, soon after. This path hadn't occurred to her initially, even though she has a Ph.D. in cell and developmental biology. There just wasn't anyone in her orbit who had done it. Her epiphany came from a book in which the author described her own journey with IVF.

"I had never heard of being a single mom by choice before that," says Terry, who is now 44. "It was like a light bulb went off."

That light bulb is going off for a lot of single women. Today, 44% of women in America are unpartnered; finding someone and settling down has become less of a priority when they're in their 20s or even 30s. And when some of them are ready to have kids, they aren't letting singlehood deter them.

Who gets to be a parent is being reshaped by increased access to IVF

The nation's first IVF baby was born in 1981, when the process was such a novelty that she was referred to as a "test tube baby." Since then, its use has surged in the United States, and today, IVF accounts for almost 100,000 births each year. That's up 50% from 10 years ago.

With IVF, which accounts for around 2% of births in America, a woman's eggs are retrieved from her body and fertilized with sperm in a lab. The resulting embryo is then implanted in her uterus, with the hope it will lead to a pregnancy.

This process has opened the door for many people who couldn't otherwise conceive children and reshaped who gets to be a parent, including more LGBTQ+ couples.

It has also become a big driver in the number of older single mothers in the U.S. at a time when the country's overall birth rate is declining. The number of unmarried women in their 40s who are having babies has grown by 250% in the last 30 years, according to data from the government. A portion of these women have partners, but many don't.

There are many reasons for this rise, says Rosanna Hertz, author of the book Single By Chance, Mothers by Choice. Increasingly, she says, young women are pursuing higher education, focusing on their careers, or fulfilling personal goals such as traveling around the world or buying homes.

And when they're ready to partner up in their mid-30s, "there's no one to settle down with," says Hertz, a sociologist with a focus on gender and family at Wellesley College. "So, am I going to spend my time waiting for somebody to come along?"

Hertz says her research shows most women who want a family would rather do it with a partner. For them, IVF is Plan B. But as their reproductive windows narrow with age, some decide to move forward by themselves.

A framed photo of Laura Terry with her mother, Jo, holding baby Eleanor.

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Jessica Ingram

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Becoming a mother is a marker of adulthood for them, Hertz says.

"There is a sense that I'm now ready to do something that is selfless, that involves the care and nurture of another human being and be part of a broader community," she says. "What a child does is tie you into a community."

Do I really want to have a baby? How do I choose a donor?

Terry saw that care and community in her own sister's family, when it drew her to Nashville to spend time with her nephews.

Once she knew she wanted to be a mom, she started mapping out her path through the language she understood, which is spreadsheets and PowerPoints.

"I made a decision tree," she says.

The root of that tree was a fundamental question: Did she really want a child? It branched from there to examine how she would become a mother and which path would give her the best chance of having a baby. It led her to IVF.

Soon enough, she was faced with another decision: choosing a sperm donor. Faced with an array of choices, she resorted to another spreadsheet "that was like 30 rows long and 30 columns wide."

In it, she started by listing factors like race, height, ethnicity and education. Then she narrowed it down to a few that really mattered to her: "I cared about some physical attributes to look like me. And I cared about family health history."

Terry was extremely lucky with her IVF process: She got pregnant on her first try. She gave birth to Eleanor in 2021 and Margaret came two years later.

"I should be quite grateful for what my process was," Terry says. "The results were beyond what you statistically expect."

Terry actively tries to find ways to engage her kids. Sometimes she buys a "decoy cucumber" so that when she's prepping dinner, 4-year-old Eleanor can peel it and feel helpful. Terry says, "It's a great use of 75 cents for an extra cucumber."

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Jessica Ingram

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She's right: The odds of conceiving a child with just one try of IVF are below 50% after a woman turns 35. And the chances drop rapidly each year after that. Many women try multiple cycles of IVF with no guarantee that they'll get pregnant.

Pregnancies at an older age can also carry health risks for both mom and child, with a high chance of miscarriage. All of this can take a huge physical and emotional toll.

Women with higher education are the top users of IVF

When Kate Snyder, who lives in northern New Jersey, was ready to have a kid, she looked for the right guy. "And, you know," she says, "it didn't happen."

Snyder was already in her 40s when she started thinking of IVF.

Kate Snyder and her 2-year-old daughter get ready for day care at their home in northern New Jersey. An interior designer and artist, Snyder made the decision to undergo IVF when she was in her 40s.

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Thalia Juarez

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"Once I came to terms with the fact that the father of my child doesn't have to be the person I end up with, and you separate the two, it's very freeing," she says. "And it just took the pressure off."

Now 48, she is the mother of a 2-year-old daughter, who loves to talk and fills their home with chatter. "She comes home from day care with gossip," says Snyder, who is an interior designer and artist. "She's telling me who pooped their pants and how the teacher had a lollipop today and this person got out of her cot."

Snyder says Google, her former employer, covered a small portion of the cost of freezing her eggs. But she paid for the IVF process herself.

Each time a woman tries to get pregnant via IVF, the cost can range from $15,000 to over $30,000. It's why IVF is out of reach for many.

Snyder wasn't prepared in her mid-40s for the amount of carrying her baby needed in the first two years, whether it was up and down the stairs or getting her in and out of the car.

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Thalia Juarez

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It's gotten the attention of President Trump. In October, he announced proposals to help reduce the cost of the drugs necessary for IVF. He also encouraged employers to offer broader infertility coverage directly to workers.

Some people go into debt, while others like Snyder use up their savings. Some women, like Terry, have theirs covered by insurance. Even that is not common — only 1 in 4 companies with more than 200 employees pays for a part of the process.

Women with higher education — especially master's degrees, doctorates or professional degrees — are more likely to use IVF than those with less education, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

These women, on average, have higher incomes. All that gives them the agency to start and support their own family.

"My knees hurt"

Both Terry and Snyder were financially comfortable enough to step off the career treadmill and create time and space for their new families. Snyder now works four days a week. Terry took a pay cut for a different role that was less intense — it allowed her to work from home and requires less travel. Neither has qualms about it.

"It's so physical being a mom. I don't think I expected that," says Snyder.

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Thalia Juarez

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Still, parenting in your 40s is hard.

"It's so physical being a mom. I don't think I expected that," says Snyder, thinking back to her first two years of motherhood and carrying her daughter up and down the stairs or getting her in and out the car. "Motherhood in your 40s, you know, my knees hurt and there are things that are starting to fall apart."

For Terry, one of the hardest parts of being a single mom is not being able to take a break. "If I'm tired or had a rough day at work or I'm frustrated, I'm feeling overwhelmed and I want to step away from my kids, I often can't," she says. "I have to meet their needs first and meet my needs later. And that's hard."

And then there is the weight of decision-making. She discusses her choices with her friends and family, "but ultimately all of that rests on me and that feels really heavy," she says.

Saturday mornings are music class days. Being silly with her kids has helped Terry loosen up and relate to them in a different way. They sing all the time. Her kids make up nursery rhymes on their way to day care or bath time or even while brushing their teeth.

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Jessica Ingram

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NPR

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"Was he sorry I didn't have a husband?"

Even though there are more families like Terry's and Snyder's today, they're still rare. And society hasn't quite caught up with them.

Like when Terry moved to her new home in Nashville, she introduced herself and the girls to a neighbor, who asked what her husband did for work. Terry explained that they were a "mom and kids family" with two cats. The response took her aback.

"He said, 'Oh, I'm so sorry,'" she recalls. "Was he sorry I didn't have a husband? I still don't know to this day. But there is very much like a moment of feeling other and different — and that's often an uncomfortable feeling."

Terry worries about how her daughters will handle such questions. She prepares her oldest child by role-playing with her. But even then, sometimes it doesn't quite play out the way they've practiced.

Recently, she recalls, one of her daughter's classmates said, "'Hey, Eleanor, is that your mom?' And she said, 'Yes.' And they said, 'Well, where's your dad?' And Eleanor just froze in that moment."

But more often than not, the tenderness of motherhood triumphs over such unsettling interactions. Terry treasures the sweet moments she shares with her kids, like when they climb onto her bed in the morning to wake her or when they sit next to each other on the couch to read before bedtime.

"I love moments where they say, 'Mama, I need a snuggle.' Just holding them for a minute or two and seeing how that calms them is really, really powerful."
Copyright 2026 NPR

Terry reads to her daughters as they snuggle with her on the couch.

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Jessica Ingram for NPR

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Over his nearly 50-year career, Burbank-based attorney Dennis Block has built a reputation as a fierce advocate for Southern California landlords seeking to evict their tenants.

But disciplinary charges filed against him last month by the California State Bar raise questions about his treatment of clients.

Block faces charges involving a series of clients over a span of years. According to the 10 counts against him, Block allegedly collected payments wrongly described as “non-refundable,” failed to account for his fees and didn’t return a client’s property in a timely manner following termination of his employment.

In one case, Block allegedly failed to pay court sanctions on time. In another, he allegedly created a conflict of interest by representing both a tenant and her landlord.

When LAist asked Block how he responded to the charges, he told us to reach out to his defense attorney Erin Joyce. In a statement, Joyce said, “While we cannot comment on the specifics of the case, we believe the matter will be resolved in Mr. Block’s favor prior to trial at the settlement conference.”

The ultimate penalty in California State Bar Court is disbarment, which would prevent Block from continuing to practice law. Lesser punishments could involve a brief suspension or an order to complete an ethics exam.

Should fees have been ‘non-refundable’?

This isn’t the first time Block has faced repercussions for alleged ethical lapses in recent years.

In 2023, LAist reported on a filing Block’s firm submitted in an eviction case that contained multiple references to fake case law. Legal experts told us the filing, which led to court sanctions, was likely produced through misuse of AI.

Legal ethics experts said the new charges against Block are serious.

“The worst thing a lawyer can do is steal a client's money,” said Scott Cummings, a law professor at UCLA. “This is effectively what the bar is saying Mr. Block has done here in roughly half a dozen cases.”

Many counts involve Block allegedly charging up-front fees described by his firm as “non-refundable.” Bar rules state such fees must constitute a “true retainer,” meaning money paid to reserve an attorney’s availability for a specific case or period of time.

LAist previously reported that former clients have complained about poor communication and a lack of availability from Block and his associates.

Richard Zitrin, an emeritus lecturer with UC Law San Francisco, said the rules may sound esoteric, but the bar takes violations seriously.

“When you get right down to what's going on under the surface, it looks like the accusations are that this guy could not do the work for these various clients,” Zitrin said. “If it's one time, it could just be an honest mistake. But if he's doing it repeatedly, serially, of course that's of more concern.”

Representing both sides?

In one case, Block’s firm is accused of taking on a tenant who was in a dispute with her roommate. A few months later, while still representing the tenant, Block’s firm allegedly took on the tenant’s landlord. Block’s firm then sent a letter threatening to evict his own client, according to the charges.

“Lawyers cannot represent opposite sides of a particular case because they owe their duty of loyalty and confidentiality to each client,” said Laurie Levenson, a law professor at Loyola Law School. “It's very likely that one side or the other will feel that the lawyer sold out to the other client.”

Despite the severity and the number of allegations, UCLA’s Cummings said Block’s disciplinary record — which shows no infractions so far — could help him avoid disbarment.

“Suspension seems like — if these facts were all proven to be true — definitely an appropriate sanction in this particular case,” Cummings said.

It’s not yet clear what the charges could mean for Block’s firm, which prides itself on handling a high volume of cases at any given time. Block once reportedly described himself as “a man who has evicted more tenants than any other human being on the planet Earth.”

A status conference in Block’s case is set for Feb. 9.