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New to The Lou: When Things Don’t Go Right, Go Left

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You may have heard the say­ing, “When things don’t go right, go left.” As we ap­proach the fourth quar­ter of the fall se­mes­ter, you may feel a lit­tle ex­tra stress, or like noth­ing is go­ing right. Maryville Stu­dents; Go left at Left­y’s Bagels!

Photo courtesy of Maddie Hill

Left­y’s Bagels was es­tab­lished in 2021 by a broth­ers-in-law duo, Scott Lefton and Doug Gold­en­berg. The pair brings New York-style, ar­ti­san bagels to the heart of St. Louis at 13359 Olive Blvd. Here you can find a va­ri­ety of bagel cre­ations rang­ing from plain bagels and cream cheese to deli bagel sand­wich spe­cials.

Mr. Scott Lefton, a St. Louis na­tive, has been coast to coast dur­ing his en­deav­ors post-grad­u­a­tion from Drake Uni­ver­sity. He has lived in many big cities such as Chicago and Los An­ge­les, as well as many trips to New York. Each city had some­thing that St. Louis was miss­ing.

“There were bagel shops on every cor­ner,” Lefton says. A seem­ingly big­ger city lux­ury that he and his brother-in-law, Doug Gold­en­berg, wanted to make pos­si­ble in St. Louis.

The bagel busi­ness came to life as Lefton de­scribed it, “pop-up style,” sell­ing bagels just on the week­ends at a shared bak­ery space.

Photo courtesy of Maddie Hill

 “We started off very small, at a lo­ca­tion just down the road,” says Lefton. When the cus­tomer buzz be­came more fre­quent, the two de­cided to move to a more per­ma­nent lo­ca­tion.

This is where you can find them now, from 7:00 A.M. to 2:00 P.M Tues­day-Sun­day.

Dur­ing my visit to Left­y’s, I or­dered the “Every­thing Bagel” with plain schmear. It did not dis­ap­point, es­pe­cially for the price. At un­der $4 for one of the daily bagel se­lec­tions, you can get a bang for your buck. And don’t worry, the por­tion was just right, and no crumb was left.

As a stu­dent who is not from the St. Louis area, mak­ing me some­one new to the “Lou,” it has been my goal to visit one-of-a-kind places and most im­por­tantly, restau­rants and cof­fee shops that I do not have where I’m from. I en­joy vis­it­ing ex­otic es­tab­lish­ments that have to be “found” in­stead of cor­po­rate spots or fran­chises. There is a first time for every­thing, and this week I made my first visit to Left­y’s. 

Lau­ren Dick­hut, a sec­ond-year phys­i­cal ther­apy ma­jor at Maryville, se­lected a more ex­otic choice from the menu. She or­dered the “West Coast Av­o­cado” which is one of their sig­na­ture bagel sand­wiches.

Dick­hut de­scribes her ex­pe­ri­ence at Left­y’s Bagels with en­thu­si­asm, “they [staff] were very wel­com­ing and the menu had a large va­ri­ety for any time of the day.” 

She also says her sand­wich se­lec­tion was one she would or­der again.

West Coast Avocado Sandwhich from the Lefty’s Bagels menu. Photo courtesy of Maddie Hill

Maryville Saints, the end of the se­mes­ter comes with a lot more than ex­tended study­ing and fi­nals; din­ing dol­lars are also on their de­cline. A bud­get-friendly eatery awaits you, lo­cated just 7 min­utes from cam­pus. Start your day off right with a spe­cialty break­fast/​brunch at Left­y’s Bagels. Mr. Lefton him­self has a mes­sage for Maryville stu­dents, “feel free to drop in any­time!”

Fol­low along this se­mes­ter as I dis­cover and dis­sect unique St. Louis spots like Left­y’s!

You can check out their menu and more in­for­ma­tion at https://​left­ys­bagels.com/

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