Midweek Mugging: East Coast Bakery

Gerry Lonergan, owner of East Coast Bakery, is this week’s Midweek Mugging recipient.

Found at 6257 Quinpool Road, the bakery offers cookies, baguettes, loaves of sourdough and challah buns, but is arguably best-known for its bagels.

“Everyone calls me the bagel guy,” said Lonergan, who can occasionally be found standing outside the shop holding a bagels sign.

East Coast Bakery offers six different types of bagels: sesame, poppy seed, plain, cinnamon, onion “all in” and salted pretzel. Lonergan estimated that on a normal day, the bakery makes around 1,200 of them.

“People think there’s really only two bagel kinds, there’s Montreal style and New York style,” Lonergan said. “So I said no, I’m going to make something unique to here. So we call ourselves an east coast-style bagel.”

He explained that what makes the bagels at East Coast Bakery unique to the city is the use of sourdough.

“Even if you were to bring, let’s say, a San Francisco sourdough [to Halifax], within a couple of weeks just from the air, the climate, the water, you’re going to overpower it with natural wild yeast from here that are local,” he said.

Lonergan said sesame bagels are the most popular choice, both for customers and for himself.

“I love it with a lot of butter and dipped in an egg,” he said. “That’s my favourite breakfast in the world.”

Lonergan, who was raised in Montreal, has a background in electronics but has been interested in baking since he was young.

“Cooking was very important in our family, I grew up with it,” he said.

In addition to its usual products, the bakery has recently introduced a “Chebucto brown bread,” made with molasses and wheat flour to make it feel “a little more rustic.” The bakery also has plans to introduce a green tea bun made with matcha.

Along with what it sells in store, the bakery provides different breads and bagels to a few cafes and restaurants within the city. Recently, Lonergan partnered with Primal Kitchen to create a black hamburger bun made with charcoal for Halifax Burger Week.

“On this street there’s like six, seven cafes, so we don’t compete with them, we work with them,” Lonergan said. “And we send people there, if people just want a sandwich—[we say] go over there, to Dilly Dally, Other Bean, Lucky Penny.”

The bakery has gained popularity across Nova Scotia, with customers from areas including Wolfville and Annapolis, and even as far outside the province as Calgary.  

“It’s funny how many times we’ll see somebody who will say, ‘Oh, I don’t really like bagels,’ or, ‘I don’t really like most types of bread,’ and then they’ll try it, and they’re completely surprised,” Lonergan said.

Ultimately, he said he gets people of all ages and demographics coming into his store throughout the day.

“Everybody loves it—bread brings people together,” he laughed.