New York Bagel Deli & Bakery in Santa Monica, Ca.

Adaeze Nwanonyiri & Lenny Rosenberg, Co-Owners

Origins

LR: We met 13 years ago at a P.R. event in Malibu. We exchanged phone numbers. We got along very well. And we decided to work together. She’s a designer. I’m a baker. We thought it would make an interesting mix. At the time, I had a restaurant called Lenny’s Deli and Bakery. It used to be Junior’s right on Westwood Blvd. She came in there redesigned the place and then the menu and it prospered. Then we went out and did other shops like that. Along the way we got married. We’ve done various bakeries since then. This one came about eight, nine months ago. I knew it was on the market for a number of years. We found out the owner really wanted to retire. We thought it was a perfect location for us because the west side is where all our customers are. We’ve well-known for bakeries, especially Bae’s Bakery. We thought it would be perfect, a deli with New York bagels, and we added the bakery section. We have a show and a book It’s a Sweet World, so it’s a natural fit. In California it works great. Everyone loves the name New York. You can make the worst product in the world and call it New York, and people are going to flock there. Whether they stay is another matter. The guy who owned this named it New York Bagels. He built the shop for Manhattan bagels. Then we bought it and renamed it NYBD & Bakery.

Company Mission

AN: From my perspective, you can’t beat the signs around the booths. They represent the boroughs of New York City and also the people. When they walk in, you can hear their accents. The vibe is very fast-paced. You come in, you order and you pay up front. It’s not slow, kind of five-star L.A. Also, I implemented the booths you’re sitting in now for that extra New York umph. We have a lot of transplanted New Yorkers who come in here from the Upper West Side, Brooklyn, Long Island. It makes them feel at home. We have the bags of flour out so people feel at home. Even things like the Boar’s Head sign brings people back to New York.

LR: We have a very loyal clientele here. They grew up in New York. They know a true bagel. The ones who grew up in California know an Einstein or a Noah’s or Western. They’re done in a rack oven, so they’re very soft as opposed to ours that have a nice crust on the outside. Everyone notices the difference. There’s no bagel shop in California that sells the amount of bagels we sell here. The ratio of bagels to deli food here is probably 70% to 30, whereas with almost any other bagel shop in Southern California, it’s the reverse. It’s traditionally a Jewish bakery item, and Jewish bakeries are a dying breed.

Signature Products

LR: The red velvet kona cupcake is our signature dessert. We’ve been on TV numerous times, and it’s in the premier episode of the show. We also make Italian rainbow cookies, traditional challah and rugelach.

AN: Challahs. Depending on the season, we have chocolate chip challah, poppy seed challah, sesame seed challah. We make a challah for the Jewish holidays. I want to tell the customers everything is made fresh here every single day. When you ship, it’s not the same thing.

Every story is based on the customer. We had customers who came in and asked for the Ukrainian poppy seed rolls. We did a lot of trial and error. They told us why it was important to them to reconnect with their families in Ukraine who they had no communication with because they had lost them. Once they lost them, we saw the tears coming out. We did our research. We want to see it on special occasions, like Christmas or Easter, so it connects people with their families. Every dish has a reason behind it. The red velvet Kona cupcakes we sell here are a Nigerian Jewish dessert because we can make it Kosher. The Kola nut is a fruit from Nigeria, where my family is from. The Ebo tribe had to have this nut to present to the father of the bride before asking for the hand in marriage. You have to do it. If you don’t do it, Lenny would not be accepted. Lenny said he wanted to get married, so I said, okay, you have to do the knocking-on-the-door ceremony with the kola nut, because it symbolizes prosperity, peace and a good omen. So we had to go get the kola nut in Houston, because my dad is there. Lenny had to fly to Houston, get the kola nut and then present it to my father in the knocking-on-the-door ceremony. Everyone wants a successful marriage, so they come in here and they get the red kola nut cupcake.

We have the green and whites that we’re going to sell in October, because Nigerian Independence Day is October first and those are the colors of the flag. You’ll see a lot of people wearing green and white. We plan on pureeing the cassava yams, which are a part of the cookie, because in Africa, all of the farmers are known for growing the cassava yams. In Africa, women who eat the cassava yams in multitudes often have twins. Central Africa has the highest rate of twin births in the world. My mom is a twin. My uncle is a twin. My cousin is a twin. My brother just had twins. My sister just had twins. My doctor told me, “You know, there’s a possibility you guys could have twins.”

Equipment ‘Must-Haves’

LR: You can’t bake anything unless you have an oven. And I’d mention the bagel-former, because we don’t roll bagels by hand; we form them. We have three different mixers here. Without them we couldn’t do business.

Production Tip

LR: For business, be vigilant and be the face of your shop. The most important thing is customer service. First, it’s the employees and then it’s customer service.

And learn how to multitask. Not just on a given day. With muffins, you can take a base mix and make different products out of that. You can take a base mix and make corn muffins. You can add blueberries. You can add cocoa powder to make chocolate, but you have to learn as a baker to be able to do that with anything. So the first thing I did was to start mixing the butter cookie mix that we make for Bae’s Bakery. With that mixture, I make Hamantaschen. I make smile-face cookies. We use it as the bottom layer for cheesecake bars, for lemon bars, pecan bars, for Linzertorte. We have this one mix and you learn how to multi-task and make ten different items out of it. The first day I was here, I made the mix and within an hour or two I had eight or nine different products in the store. You don’t need a million different recipes; you just need to learn how to manipulate each recipe to make different products. You just have to manipulate the dough a bit.

AN: Have a viable product. You can do all the marketing you want. It can look great, but at the end of the day, if the product is not superior, the store will not survive. People come in and try the product once, but they won’t come back again.

Future Plans

AN: I’ve learned what I’ve learned from Lanny and what his father taught him. I’m focused on design and helping research which ingredients will be good for international desserts. Did you know Tiger nuts symbolize prosperity and have a high iron content?  So we’re thinking of other ways to implement ingredients with stories into the desserts.

LR: Really just to keep building the bakery and the customer base. It’s possible we may branch out into other stores like this. It’s going in that direction right now. We’re actually working on a gluten-free line. It’s unlike any other gluten-free bagel you’ll try. It doesn’t have that gummy texture. It’s all-natural with buckwheat flour and Hobbs Red Mill gluten-free flour. Maple syrup is the sweetener and it tastes phenomenal toasted. You’d never know it’s gluten-free. We also make gluten-free Linzertortes and gluten-free sprinkle cookies, and we’re going to expand on that.

Photos by Caroline Mays

For more info, visit https://nybdbakery.com/

(This article appeared in the Fall 2025 issue of Pastry Arts Magazine)