Bodega Bagels — Restaurant in Belfast

This literally used to be my favourite place to eat in the whole of Belfast. Introduced so many friends and family to it who equally became obsessed.

Lately though, their standards seem to have dropped a bit (hopefully not following in the footsteps of other food places that used to be great and are now average, like Boojum). Their bagels seem smaller, the fillings less generous or weirdly cut/spread and most importantly - to me - they’ve changed their hot honey. The Hello You used to be absolutely perfect, but they’ve swapped their hot honey for one absolutely packed with chillies, so it now becomes more like a crazy Man vs Food “can you handle the heat” challenge than the delicious bagel it used to be.

Genuinely heartbreaking (pathetic, I know 😂) as I used to order from this place at least once per week. I guess my bank balance will be a little happier now, but I really hope they go back to how they used to be 🥲

EDIT: In response to Bodega’s reply - thank you for getting back to me. You make a valid point about me never previously leaving a positive review online, we all tend to leave reviews quicker after negative experiences than after positive ones and I’m guilty of that too! However, I can assure you that by word of mouth I’ve always been singing your praises and recommending to anyone I know who visits the city. I’ll be quicker to praise good experiences too moving forward.

Regarding the hot-honey-gate, I appreciate it’s a difficult balance, as something that’s not hot enough for one person is way too hot for another. I am surprised that there aren’t more comments regarding the change in spice level though as it’s such a drastic change! Could a solution be to offer customers the choice of hot honey or super hot honey when they order? (Sounds sarcastic but I’m serious 😂) I understand if this is impractical for your overhead costs having to have two types of product to offer.

Once again, thank you for taking the time to...

If you want a bagel in East Belfast, this is the place to go!

Located inside the trendy 'Banana Block' of the Portview Trade Centre. The space is very cool with nice light and there were some great beats playing, making for an interesting space to have lunch. Not busy on the Wednesday I was there, but there did appear to be a few regular customers who came in for their lunch.

You choose a bagel flavour from about 5-6 on offer, then choose a filling. The cheese and jalapeno bagel is my new favourite! Had the italiano filling, but which was filled with high quality ingredients. They had run out of panchetta so I had pastrami, but it was delicious and filling.

Also had an americano, which was as also top quality and delicious. They have a great variety of tinned cold drinks on hand too, both traditional and contemporary.

Service was pretty quick and friendly. Will...

I decided to order from Bodega bagels again considering their last reply that they have improved the service. I've ordered twice from them now and there has been no issues with the delivery, nor with messy order. Everything has been great just like the first orders. These are probably the best bagels ever and I'm happy I can order them again! The bagels are amazing, the service is horrible. I've been ordering from them using Deliveroo. This is the only restaurant that i always have issues with the deliveries and get wrong orders. Today i ordered sesame bagels and a schmear, got a call from them saying they didn't have it anymore, i agreed to get the cheddar ones instead, i got cinnamon and raisins (i hate raisins), no schmear. Called the restaurant and the only thing i was told "sorry, get a refund from deliveroo". Being busy is not an excuse for...