Hole in one – UE Bagels has opened the doors to a brand-new Palm Beach flagship
A familiar shade of navy blue has just landed on the Gold Coast Highway. UE Bagels has officially opened the doors at its new Palm Beach flagship, taking over the former Well Bread & Pastry site and turning a muted-green corner shop into the biggest version of the brand to date.
The new location is technically a relocation. UE Bagels has called Palm Beach home since September 2023, with the original store sitting just a bagel toss away – but that building has been on a demolition clause for some time, as part of a wider redevelopment sweep that has already taken several much-loved institutions out of the local landscape. Rather than wait for the wrecking ball, owners Mitchell Barling and Emily Hugo set a goal at the start of the year to lock in a permanent home before the demolition was called in. When Well Bread & Pastry suddenly closed up shop on the highway, the pair were on the phone before the lease sign had even gone up.
The new space is roughly double the old one. Where the previous Palm Beach store seated around 35, the new flagship holds 75, with tables scattered across an open-plan interior of industrial ceilings, foliage-draped pendant beams and bifold windows that open onto the street. Outside, picnic tables and bar stools spill across a sun-drenched path shaded by striped awning. Behind the scenes, the kitchen is the real drawcard. It’s the biggest in the UE network, and will eventually become the central baking hub for all three stores, allowing the fresh-daily bagel program (currently still made by Mitch in the early hours of every morning) to run from a single roof.
UE Bagels rotates its menu every six to eight months, and the new Palm Beach outpost lands mid-cycle, meaning there are some familiar faves already. There’s the Brisket Philly Cheesesteak, the Cubano, the Chicken Parmi and the Italian Cold Cuts with a halloumi swap for the vego crowd. The Garlic Roasted Mushroom and Vegan Lox cover off plant-based options, the original Lox and Breaky bagels still anchor the daily rotation, and a Pavlova bagel rounds out the sweet end of the menu.
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But two things are new for the Palm Beach store that the Varsity Lakes and Miami locations don’t have yet. Smoothies have officially landed in Choc Banana, Very Berry, Coco Mango and Green Machine, and so has a line-up of Cheesecake Milkshakes blended with actual cream cheese, available in Oreo, Maple Snap, Peanut Butter Chocolate and Strawberry. Dylan, who oversees operations on the ground, describes the result as “Canadian-American style,” which tracks – the UE Bagels concept itself was born when Mitch and Emily, living and working in Canada, started missing the bagels they had grown used to abroad.
Coffee comes from Social Espresso, as it does across the UE network. Between the bigger kitchen, the new drinks list and a future-proofed lease, UE Bagels has very publicly planted its flag in Palm Beach for the long haul.
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