Top of the Bagel

I love this place and their bagels. Good variety in bagels. Fresh, delicious bagels. Generous with their cream cheese too. I love that they have multi-​grain, whole wheat, and whole wheat everything bagels! Small place with a few tables and chairs on the inside and out. Fast, good service. In the same plaza as Marshalls, Staples, Panera Bread. I’ve been here about 50 times and will continue to come back.

This great bagel spot got the shaft when the shopping center owners let Panera Bread open. Don’t get me wrong, I like Panera, but they really should not be allowed to sell bagels. This is a small, family run business and I am sure Panera has to be hurting them. The bialys here are even better than Chicago’s (don’t know about New York ‘cuz Im not from there) and I wish they served their pumpkin bagels all year long. They are so GREAT!!! Please continue to support our local bagel shop as I’d like them to stick around for a long, long time. And their strawberry cream cheese is superb!

The best part about this experience was the actual bagel variety. A number of flavors options to choose from with very nice cream cheese choices. They have gluten free bagels as well. As an added bonus, the bagel toppings are on both sides of the bagel… I’ve rarely seen this and Iove it! The bagel top is always the best part in my opinion. My bagel «eggwich» was definitely yummy but the bagel wasn’t the freshest I’ve had…
Service was decent and the store was small. Some coffee selections but a wider array of juice/​smoothie choices. I probably wouldn’t get my bagel to stay but I will likely go back!

Love this place Ruth is awesome and the owner is friendly fast and great customer service along with tasty food lol go there all the time for fast great breakfast

If you are looking for a personal experience with friendly people and REAL bagels, this is the place to go! I’m from New york and after going to various bagel stores, this was the only shop i found to have new york style bagels. Delicious and reasonable in price.

I came here to get a bacon egg and cheese on a bialy and it was one of the worst I’ve had. The bagel was really thick and not that fresh, the egg was covering about half of the bialy, and the cheese was barely there. The people working were really nice, but I wish I just got an egg mcmuffin from McDonalds for the same price.
The bialy was good though — I would maybe stick to just bagels and cream cheese here.

This place is very hard to find. It is located in the far corner of a shopping plaza, which itself is a maze, and away from the main street.
Went with an Everything Bagel with jalepeno cream cheese. The bagel was good, a bit on the puffy side. The jalepeno cream cheese tasted like cream cheese with chunks of pickled jalepeno in it. It was OK. Orange juice is freshly squeezed, but a bit on the expensive side, about $ 2 for a small cup, with the bagel total came out to over $ 4.
Minimum $ 3 purchase if you use a debit card.

I have come here a few times to grab bagels on the way to work. The bagels are good and the staff is nice. Their prices are also better than Einstein’s.
The reason I’m not giving them 5 stars is because they always take my debit card for an extended period of time when I am paying. I don’t know why, but this bothers me. Just swipe and give it back, buddy. I’m not going anywhere until you give me my bagels anyways…

This place is an average bagel place. I’ve been there a few times but not impressed with the look and the lack of AC they had when I went.
I have been there twice and they have been out of the particular bagel I wanted. If you’re in need of a good bagel, go across the way to panera bread.

This place has many things going for it: walkable from residential neighborhoods, proximity to other shops, super friendly service, and the appeal of an independent small business. But priced like a gourmet shop and serving run-​of-​the-​mill bagels, Top of the Bagel gives customers reasons to overshoot the entrance onto the 5 and go to Einstein’s instead (cheaper, better bagels, better coffee, faster service…).
I would come back if the bagels were better…

How I adore Asha, the owner of both this location and one in Carlsbad!
Now NORMALLY, I’m SB all the way-​But I must say I really prefer the Carlsbad location over this one. When I lived up there I was a regular and was excited to try this location in SB… sadly, falls a bit short of my normal expectation from my frequent Cbad visits-​See soon to be published review of it’s glory.
They DO have the non-​dairy vanilla creamer that I so love in my hazelnut or vanilla flavored coffee, and the same great menu… but the cbad location seems… fresher than this one. Service is so so too. Flavors wise! Try the blueberry or Cinnamon Sugar… both lovely toasted with just butter. They also offer an array of smoothies, acai bowls, and a few lunch items.
They stock Yoo-​Hoo, and for some people, that’s reason enough to come from miles around! Also as another Unilocaler mentioned, Top Of The Bagel places spices and things like cinnamon sprinkles on BOTH sides of the bagel flavors… It makes a huge difference. I want my everything bagel WITH EVERYTHING, all the time, every bite… TOTB has that figured out.
A solid bagel place so give it a shot… if you’re in cbad go to that one and tell Asha I miss her.

Bagels close to stale tasting at the end of the day (2pm Saturday — their closing time)
Salads had prepackaged turkey deli meat and (bbq) chicken. Don’t waste a buck for a few scraps of tasteless cheapo meat. Raisins were hard as rocks, ranch dressing was thick and bland, overall both our salads were under your average expectations.
I stood for 10 minutes while the lady with the gray hair just sat their instead of ringing me up. Then she rang up the customer that was after me. She was distant and not welcoming in the least way.
I should have gone across the street to Panera!
I wouldn’t recommend this place.

non-​descript interior. the bagels are uninspired, flavorless, cream cheese layered on too thick, and kinda nasty. turkey cashew with chopped up turkey and veg looks awful, also flavorless… ended up scraping most everything off and just having some smoked salmon…
better bagels can be found in the store, as well as good olé philly cream cheese…
prices aren’t outrageous, but this place is an AVOID.

Hair in a sandwich and black avocado made for a less than positive experience. Getting glared at by the man ringing us up when I asked for 3 waters to go with our 3 sandwiches… even less positive. Especially when I was also buying a dozen bagels and a bag of bagel chips to go with them!
The girl who worked here was nice enough, the food is priced comparably to other bagel shops and the taste is what I would expect. But the above mentioned concerns will encourage me to take my bagel business elsewhere.
They have no public restroom and parking is in a large shared (and crowded) lot.

Beware if you bought a Groupon for this place — PRINT IT OUT to use it. It says right on the Groupon that you can use it by pulling it up on your mobile app, but the man at the counter argued with me for 10 minutes before allowing me to use it.
The bagels are good, but the customer service makes me wary about ever going back.

Been in this place a few times over the years for morning bagels, but haven’t felt compelled to write a review until today. Bagels are always fresh and tasty, very generous with the spread. Large selection if you’re there early in the morning.
I wasn’t feeling like any of my normal lunch stops so I went in for a sandwich earlier today. Their menu is pretty straightforward, went with turkey, avocado and bacon on a toasted bialy, with lettuce and tomato. It was so good I stopped eating so I could take a picture for a Unilocal review. Bialy was toasted to a perfect crustyness, vegetables were fresh, bacon was crisp. Includes potato salad, very good portion for the cost.
Never had a bad experience with service — they are always very polite and quick with your order. Will be back very soon to try the bbq sandwich.

Stopped here for a quick lunch this past Sunday. I wanted a sandwich, and then I wanted a bagel for dessert, so I was hoping this place would take care of both.
Ordered a bagel sandwich with turkey, avo and cheese. Easy sandwich to make, but I wasn’t really impressed. Call me a sandwich snob, but it tasted like processed turkey. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll eat it all day but I prefer the fresh deli meats. I also had a bagel with cream cheese, which was hot and not short on cream cheese. It was toasted just right. There bagel selection was slim, but that’s because they were about to close.
Wouldn’t be my first choice but it wasn’t bad either.

If you really know from bagels, this is the only place to get them in San Diego.
Signed, a Chicago Jew.

Every once in a while a rep will bring in these stupid bagel/​cream cheese hunks o’ heaven. We all roll our eyes because we all know no matter how hard we try to resist; those delicious things will end up haunting us until we give in to their ooey gooey chewy warm wicked ways.
Curse you scrumptioulescent bagel/​cream cheese/​sometimes sprinkled with chocolate chips things!

I come here when I don’t want to fight the crowds at Einstein’s, especially the one in Carmel Valley where the mommies with their big hair-​dos fight to the death to hold their place in line.
It’s never overly crowded, the prices are ok, and the bagels are fresh.
The location is kind of strange and out of the way but who cares when you can get in and out quickly.