July 21, 2026 • 19 mins
Jarrett Seltzer, owner of Bagels By Jarrett, shares how homemade bagels turned into a wildly successful restaurant that even fed World Cup teams, and why his brutally honest responses to one-star reviews have become almost as famous as the food.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Today's Daily Highlight from Elvis Duran in the Morning Show.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Holy potatoes, How are we supposed to do a show
with this? This is unbelievable. Yeah, here's the thing about pizza.
We're discussing this a moment ago, and you were gonna
find out why in a second. Here in New York
and New Jersey, Long Island, it used to be just
a couple of places that were the stars of the
show when it came to pizza, and that was okay,
(00:26):
We're fine with it. Didn't know there was anything else.
And then all of a sudden, these incredible artists started
hitting it up in the kitchen and in these ovens
and came out with different types of dough and crust
and toppings, the whole thing. And now you have all
these unique superstars in the pizza world here, and they're
(00:48):
all fantastic, and some of them don't have anything in common,
but they're all just great. So I just discovered another one.
Jarrett Seltz here, Hi, Jarreed, welcome to the show. Thanks
for having me, well, thanks for being had so Jared.
Bagels by Jarrett. Yep, he was like, well, bagels by Jarrett,
(01:10):
you're talking about pizza. Why don't you walk us through that?
So for years I gave away bagels from home.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
I used to be a director producer, and then I
was editing an animating video content more and I started
making bagels at home and I would give them out
on the Facebook group in town, and the rule was
you had to take a picture of the bagel, you
had to give a review of the bagel, and you
had to pay it forward. Somehow in town, I did
to pay it forward thing because the guys who ran
that Facebook group didn't really like me. So I figured
if we were doing something charitable, they couldn't shut me
(01:39):
down with.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
What I was doing.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
Okay, so it's a pretty smart move and it worked,
and we gave away bagels or I gave gave him
away for years. And then fast forward to friends. I
used to play in a band and the singer of
the band came up we were going to see a concert.
I made some bagels for him. Then his brother came
over the next day and I made bagels for him.
He said, weren't you doing anything with this?
Speaker 2 (01:57):
So everyone loved your bagels and the bagels was like pizza.
People very very picky about the bagels.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
Yes, it's a serious like you can't mess around with it,
and especially when you're opening the bagel shop in a
town where there's been a bagel shop for thirty years
to West Orange. Okay, you know you're you're taking a
chance with it. So he said, this is a great bagel.
Why aren't you doing anything with it? I said, I
don't have any money. He said, I have money, and
he became my first investor. And so, long story short,
I raised the money that I needed to raise. We
(02:22):
had a six month build out, We opened our shop
super successful right off the bat, and three weeks later
the pandemic hit.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Okay, well, oh yeah, okay, and you know what it
looks like, disaster and sometimes the pandemic was disaster for
many operators, but it was also a blessing and a gift.
It gave you time to do things and make things
happen and learn about yourself and this and that. Yeah,
well it was and you survived.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Oh the pandemic was honestly great for us because we
were take out, We were new, we were hot, that
we were the hot thing, and no one had anything
to do. So they would wait in their cars for
an hour back then to just to order. But they
had nothing else to do there playing on their phones
at home. So why they just play on your phone
the car while you're waiting for some food?
Speaker 2 (03:03):
There you go. So how does that bring us to
pizza today? Well? Very good. So you started messing around
with pizza, we.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
Yeah, Well actually started with the fried chicken sandwich that
you have a talk about that, all right, So that's
called the lawsuit.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
That's the that's the slider version of it.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
When we were I was bored because it was we
were curbside now and making bagels isn't fun. So I
made the fried chicken sandwich for my crew and they're like,
this is awesome. Why don't we put it on the menu.
And I'm like, well, we're a bagel shop. And then
we're like, but it's COVID rules don't matter anymore, right,
So we put the fried chicken sandwich on the menu,
and we had forty people outside an hour before we
opened to get it. They never had it, and then
(03:41):
word started spreading about the chicken sandwich. And I was
never a chef. I said, like, I came from a
band video production. I just happened to open this place
and I go for it.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I was a good cook. People came to my house
to eat, you know, but how'd you get to pizza?
From chicken sandwiches and bagels to pizza?
Speaker 3 (03:55):
So I wanted to start doing I got excited. So
I'm like, well, I make a good pasta. I make
a good this, right, And like I just keep adding
all these crazy things to the menu. And then I
was the head chef at that point. So there I
was cooking dinner, making the pastas, you know, doing the
pasta station, and I'm selling a ton of pasta and
I'm dying every single night, and I'm like, I've got
to spread this out. I got to get people to
buy something out. I want them to buy my pasta.
(04:15):
But I can't make a hundred pasta to night while
other people in the shops lines aren't as busy.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
So what if we had pizza to it?
Speaker 3 (04:21):
Maybe people will get some pizza some pasta, right obviously,
what if we add the caesar salad, maybe that the
cold sandwich line and salad line, they'll get a little
bit busier, right, So like spread it out so that
I don't die all at once.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Okay, he's dying slowly instead. So this cuzzi you brought
up today is world class pizza and you just got
the dough right in your in your opinion, yes and so.
And you're good friends with our friends at Buckie's. Sure
am shout out to do. It's like we're pizza people.
Speaker 4 (04:49):
Yeah, but you guys are friends.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
They're all like doing each other. We we yeah, we are.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
You know. We have a group chat with like twenty
different pizza shop owners and some of the best you
know around and we all just help each other out. Right.
So it's like someone's mixer breaks and you're like, hey,
you got a mixer guy. You know, someone runs out
of cheese because they had a busy weekend. It's like, hey,
does anybody have Grande cheese I can borrow? So yeah, no, Dom.
You know, Dom was much like me. He didn't come
from that. He was never in food. So he comes
to test out my oven. That's how I met him,
(05:16):
and I was like, dude, you're the best pizza that's
tested out the South.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
Maybe it's best not to come from food because you
just want to create your own. Okay, here, I'm looking
at some stuff about about bagels by Jar online Google reviews.
Are you ready? For this, I know they cannot. Sometimes
they're not very kind. You sorted by by one star,
because that's so much more so so you're talking about
starting out with bagels. Then here comes a chicken sandwich
and I saw chicken palm out there, yes, and now pizzas. Now,
(05:41):
this guy Nicholas says, best donut I ever had? What
the hell is going on down there? Just cereal doughnuts? Doughnuts?
Did I didn't?
Speaker 4 (05:58):
Insane?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
Okay, tell them about to say it's salad tastes incredible.
Tell them how much business you do with salad.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
So we have our manu literally has like three hundred
plus items on it, like it's stupid that it shouldn't
make any sense. That's the Lord's Caesar Salad, as we
call it, exactly right. The name makes complete sense to
you at this point.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
I love it.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
And for a menu with over three hundred items, that
salad accounts for five percent of our sales every single month.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
Salad, I'm gonna take it home. I'm gonna taste sadie
and stuff some in my purse.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Is incredible. You guys do a pizza out of that too.
We do the Lords Caesar Pizza Okay, now I have
to bring us up to current day. This is this
is the reason the reason Jarrett is here today. You
got a lot of exposure because of World Cup. That
is true. This is true. As a matter of fact,
West Orange is here, Montclair is here, and this is
(06:48):
where the Spa, the Spain players are staying. Right and
there in the Argentinas as well. Argententines were the Short
Hills Hilton. Okayway right. Norway stayed at the same hotel
as Spain. Yeah, right there, right there, right there, next door.
I used to live. I used to live in Llewellyn Park.
I know the area, very well haunted house not good. Interesting,
it's an interesting community. It is, thank you. Anyway. So
(07:11):
you got a call one day from the hotel, you know,
the chef at the hotel, and and he said, or
she said, uh what uh?
Speaker 3 (07:17):
He I had just gotten back from Mexico, was on
the family trip, and he messaged me and he said, hey,
I need to feed Norway pizza tomorrow after the game.
And I treated the entire country of Norway after the
game of med Life. And I had, like I guess,
I had like vacation bring going on. I was just like,
oh okay, like fine, and he's like, can you deliver
the I'm like, well, you know, we don't do our
(07:38):
own delivery. You gotta order online and then you know deliver,
which I literally said the door dasher with Dorway's pizzas,
I was, I just wasn't paying attention. And then I
was watching the Doorway games like why did I not
offer the deliver these pizzas myself?
Speaker 2 (07:50):
Like what Norway? They wrote? Wrote? Well, they got back
really late. That was way past my bedtime. Yeah. When
they win, they like to hang out at the stadium. Yeah, okay,
so you just a pizza order came in and it's
all World Cup related, yes, and then Spain.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Calls and then Spain calls and the coolest part about
it was, I've been working on my pizza dough for
five months about I wanted to switch it. I wanted
my dough to be better and better and better. And
Saturday morning, we actually took pizza out of the oven
and it was the best the pizza dough had been.
I literally like looked at my pizza guy. I high
five to him, like we nailed it. The pizza recipe
(08:25):
is done. We had taken every note every little thing
we did, the temperature of this, how long we mixed it,
for the speed on the mixer, every little piece to
making the dough. And an hour later we got the
message that Spain wanted pizzas.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
Okay, so you perfected your your your dough. Yes, sorry
Norway and Spain called, and then Spain calls, and then
these pizzas are incredible. Did bar pies are my favorite?
I got you, and but you have the Sicilian style,
you have the thick one, you have the regular ones,
and the flavors are insane. Okay, there's always two sides
to every story. Don't you love Google review? I love them.
(08:58):
This place is very over priced. I should have walked out.
Four dollars for a regular coffee, which wasn't large, twelve
dollars for breakfast sandwich on a bagel. It sounds like
normal to us. Only three choices of bagels and the
everything bagel had more seeds than bagel. I was passing through,
not local, would never go back, not long, and the
Jarrett replied, yes, you should have walked out. My staff
(09:23):
was telling me about how awful you were. Luckily I
wasn't there.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
Yeah, he's not in the area anyway, he's not coming back,
I know exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
But you know, we learned this here with people texting us.
The people can just sit out there in the dark
and type whatever they want and we'd never reply to them.
But sometimes you need to reply and go hey, look butthole. Yeah,
once in a while, you gotta do it. I've toned
it down a little bit from my younger punk rog
three hundred items on your menu. And this, by the way,
if you're just turning us on Jarrett Seltzer's here bagels
(09:54):
by Jarrett, of course, and donuts by Jarrett, and chicken
sandwiches by Jarrett and salvage by Jarrett. It goes on
IMPOSTA pizza is in frank incredible. So you've been on
ten ten wins, you've been on Channel seven. I mean
you've been They're all they're knocking on your doors and
just because you've fed a bunch of hockey players, uh
soccer play. Wait, did they send you like a picture
(10:15):
of like le mean yamal eating your pizza. They didn't.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
They sent me one picture of the pizzas being out
for Norway. It was like all I had And then
it's what every news network ran.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
With the same to get any feedback from them at all.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
Both times. Both times everything was finished.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
Okay, Norway crushed there is in twenty minutes, they said,
of course, Okay Norway.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
That brought their own food, Yes, because they thought American
They did somewhat, somewhat not not completely. See the news
stories where they brought their own food because they think
we're poisoning it with our food. Well, they hate and
they eat pretty healthy.
Speaker 3 (10:45):
Oh yeah, they did bring their own salmon that I
know a lot of U. I O s yeah uh text.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
As a resident of West Orange who's been following his journeys,
just the big beginning of his store, I can attest
to this place being amazing, amazing bagels, amazing pizza. The
chicken salad is to die for. Would you sell a
lot of chickens out?
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
You do? You know? Congratulations on everything. Thank you, Oh Sabina,
she coaches on the phone. Wait where do you Where
do you live in West Orange? Are you in Llewellen
Park as well with the haunted houses? I ain't there yet,
brot more pizzas. This is Sabina, She's your neighbor. Where
do you live? Sabina?
Speaker 1 (11:18):
I live in the Highlands. It's like townhouses that are
behind Eagle Rock and we've been ordering there since. Jarrett
had like the Papa that like a little bakery that
was off of main streets, and you had the stuffygles,
which were insanely bad for you as from a health perspective,
but they're delicious. I remember, this is one thing I wish.
(11:42):
I haven't had it in a while. But it was
called the Lawyer but everything.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
Why do you call it the lawsuit? You got sued
by someone?
Speaker 3 (11:50):
No, I called it the McChicken when I used to
make it for my friends and then sorry, I messed
that up and I got left. I called it the
mcjarrett's I'm an idiot. It was the mcjarrett and I'd
get sued. So we had because you have Mick on
the Jarrett.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Yeah, pleaz So Sabina, Sabina is here to stand for
you and say everything. You're making this pizza? Uh? What
was the one I had? It was it caramelized onion
and ricotta. You had the white roundish pie.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
We called it because I used to make the pizzas
and I couldn't make a round pie, so we called
them Roundish. Now I have great pizza, guys, but I
couldn't change the name, so the round pies are not roundish.
They're round, but they're called roundish.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
Okay, so good Sabina. Do you have a favorite pizza
over there?
Speaker 1 (12:28):
Oh? Bad, which is really bad because it's the camalized onion.
One is very good, but also just a plain one.
And I don't know the names off the my off
the top of my head because it's literally click click click.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Here's like a lot of weird, weird names. Creative.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Yeah, yeah, I'm just like, Okay, that has all the
ingredients I want. Cool, and there's a lot of stuff
on the menu, so it's just you just have to
know what you want and get out of there. Otherwise
you will have like decision fatigue.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
And you will not make any There's something to be
said for that, but it's all great stuff. Have you
ever thought about limiting the menu or would you get
too many complaints? I would get complaints because that's the
beauty of us, is that. Like if if Dad.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Wants chicken palm right, and Mom want Mom's gluten free
and wants Asian, and the kids want a pizza and
somebody like you can get all of it, and it's
all homemade, and it's all happens to be really good.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
Right.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Wow, you know it shouldn't work.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
It shouldn't Jared, can I Jared, can I ask you
a question?
Speaker 2 (13:23):
You may so.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
I'm on a sour dough journey right now. I've been
doing pretty good about it, and my kids love my
sour dough and I had some sour dough pizzas in
other places around Jersey and in the city. Are you
planning on your own menu?
Speaker 3 (13:38):
No sour dough for me. I'm leaving that to dom
over at BUCkies. I got enough issues on my bid. Yeah,
all right, so be We love you, Thank you for listening.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
We love you too so much.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
Have a great day. Tell her when West Orange we
said it, and welcome to ask a chef about sour dough. Yeah,
sowardough seemed to be always, so that's the thing. There's
room for everyone to do everything. Any questions for Jared
or thoughts.
Speaker 4 (14:04):
I just want to get more of salad. I've been
waiting for this.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
You want to shot up to We're loving reading the reply.
Your replies on Google reviews are hilarious. You are good yelp,
you are a saucy, sassy little winch.
Speaker 4 (14:20):
Are you normally assaulting them?
Speaker 2 (14:23):
I worked really hard.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
There's like twenty five people that rely on me to
feed their families, So don't have me because I'd make
three types of bagels.
Speaker 5 (14:30):
Somebody left a one star review and blah blah blah blah.
They're thinking you food is just mediocre. Your reply was this,
not sure what you ordered, but calling our food mediocre
while every other review you leave is also negative, makes
me think the common ingredient here may not be the restaurant.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
Amen. That's awesome. Thank you is awesome.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
We need to hire him part time to answer our technic.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
Oh you you would have a field. You deserve more
than a four point four People downvoted you, and we
got to get those scores up to a full point
scores or anything to him, scores to us or nothing. Well,
some people read that. Yeah, it's tough. It's an interesting world,
the review world. We did once.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
Actually, we yelped I had some of the issues with yelp,
so we ran a contest that you had to leave
a one star review for us on Yelp, but you
had to the review had to be amazing, and then
you had to justify why you were leaving the one
star And I said, I'll give one hundred dollars gift
cards whoever writes the best one, and like one hundred.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Something, what was the best one? I'd have to look honestly, Yeah, yeah,
yelp with the feeling they didn't like the feeling of
the toilet paper or something like that. One star. Everyone
loves a one star review. There's so much more fun
to read.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
So let's make a game out of its brilliant stars.
Speaker 4 (15:47):
First, exactly tell me everything.
Speaker 3 (15:49):
Emailed me that they were going to take away my
access to my own accounts.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
So Begel's by Jarrett. Jarrett Seltzer's here uh in West Orange.
The pizza were loving the story with UH World Cup incredible. Now.
We met Jarrett years ago nineteen thirty two thousand and four.
We had a contest called Radio Star or something like
that where local bands could send in their submissions. Jarrett
(16:14):
was in a band called Houston Calls. I was you
played with the bass barely but yes, terrible bass. I
know if you made it into the finals, didn't you.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
When you play bass every single day, you can like
fake it till you make it.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
But I was. I was by far the worst musician
bad so the name of the song was called Exit Emergency. Yep,
do you remember this song?
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (16:35):
Of course I remember you. Hear the bass and listen,
tell it sounds like a band I've heard before.
Speaker 3 (16:51):
Kill.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Your bass is really booming in there. I like that
saying do you miss those days?
Speaker 4 (17:02):
Wouldn't I think you should play at the restaurant.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
I'm telling you, I'm I'm so bad. That's the beauty.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
He reunited a few years ago. I had to have
my tab on stage. I practiced for like a month,
and I still suck.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
That's okay. Do you know what when you started pizza,
it wasn't the best. I'm sure now it is the best.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
Well, it took forty years to figure out what I
was actually good at. Oh, I did think you guys
were gonna blow us up. I was like, David Brody's
gonna make me famous. This is gonna be amazing. Didn't
didn't work out that way? Your friends your friends with Brody? Right,
I am okay, because because you you have shades of
Brody in you, I can ye. I mean, when Brody
(17:42):
worked with us, he would stay on these text messages
and he would get so burt hurt over but hurt
over everything people say, and he would always entwer them
and he never did say who it was. But if
ever you've been yelled at on our on our text messages,
it was brody.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Yeah, he took a liking to our band.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
And you know radio was for music was that much
bigger back then, obviously, right, So I was.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
Like, this guy's gonna get me on Z one hundred,
like this is it. We're gonna be the next clink lady.
It just played you again. Yeah, look at that. Look
at that twenty years later, look at that. Look congratulations, Jared,
thank you, And I can't wait to come in. I'm
gonna sit down and look at that three hundred menu menu,
item menu. Jeez. But I haven't even tried to parm yet,
and that's he needs to try the parm. I meant,
(18:25):
Birdie told me last night that your a parm got
I'm has brought you apart.
Speaker 1 (18:28):
Isn't Bobby Brown's hotel the Georgia, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Yeah, yeah, it's it's a very stately hotel now in
the middle of Claire. Well class for me, what you're
trying to say, yes, that's what he's talk. I didn't
say that. Look at me anyway. H congratulations, thank you,
and you know what, and when these stories pop on
you know, local and on the networks and things like
that about those spizza guy in West Orange fed the
(18:53):
soccer players good, you know what. Whatever we can do
to get your name out there. Now you're with us,
that's awesome talk.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
I would love for Portnray to come by sometime. Hopefully
this put us on his radar.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
A little bit. We might do it absolutely, but this
pizza is fantas I can't wait to go in and
gobble down on someone. Well, I'll tell you. We make
all of our pasta in house.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
We grind our own burger meat for our burgers like
we were the real deal.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
We make. Most of our condiments are homemade, some of them.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Sometimes you need craft ranch like that's fine, but most
of our condiments are even homemade.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
So we we take it seriously. We mess around and
congratulations on everything. Thank you. I appreciate it. With Jared
of course from Bingeals by Jared. Thanks for coming into
this
Today's Daily Highlight from Elvis Duran in the Morning Show.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Holy potatoes, How are we supposed to do a show
with this? This is unbelievable. Yeah, here's the thing about pizza.
We're discussing this a moment ago, and you were gonna
find out why in a second. Here in New York
and New Jersey, Long Island, it used to be just
a couple of places that were the stars of the
show when it came to pizza, and that was okay,
(00:26):
We're fine with it. Didn't know there was anything else.
And then all of a sudden, these incredible artists started
hitting it up in the kitchen and in these ovens
and came out with different types of dough and crust
and toppings, the whole thing. And now you have all
these unique superstars in the pizza world here, and they're
(00:48):
all fantastic, and some of them don't have anything in common,
but they're all just great. So I just discovered another one.
Jarrett Seltz here, Hi, Jarreed, welcome to the show. Thanks
for having me, well, thanks for being had so Jared.
Bagels by Jarrett. Yep, he was like, well, bagels by Jarrett,
(01:10):
you're talking about pizza. Why don't you walk us through that?
So for years I gave away bagels from home.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
I used to be a director producer, and then I
was editing an animating video content more and I started
making bagels at home and I would give them out
on the Facebook group in town, and the rule was
you had to take a picture of the bagel, you
had to give a review of the bagel, and you
had to pay it forward. Somehow in town, I did
to pay it forward thing because the guys who ran
that Facebook group didn't really like me. So I figured
if we were doing something charitable, they couldn't shut me
(01:39):
down with.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
What I was doing.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
Okay, so it's a pretty smart move and it worked,
and we gave away bagels or I gave gave him
away for years. And then fast forward to friends. I
used to play in a band and the singer of
the band came up we were going to see a concert.
I made some bagels for him. Then his brother came
over the next day and I made bagels for him.
He said, weren't you doing anything with this?
Speaker 2 (01:57):
So everyone loved your bagels and the bagels was like pizza.
People very very picky about the bagels.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
Yes, it's a serious like you can't mess around with it,
and especially when you're opening the bagel shop in a
town where there's been a bagel shop for thirty years
to West Orange. Okay, you know you're you're taking a
chance with it. So he said, this is a great bagel.
Why aren't you doing anything with it? I said, I
don't have any money. He said, I have money, and
he became my first investor. And so, long story short,
I raised the money that I needed to raise. We
(02:22):
had a six month build out, We opened our shop
super successful right off the bat, and three weeks later
the pandemic hit.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Okay, well, oh yeah, okay, and you know what it
looks like, disaster and sometimes the pandemic was disaster for
many operators, but it was also a blessing and a gift.
It gave you time to do things and make things
happen and learn about yourself and this and that. Yeah,
well it was and you survived.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Oh the pandemic was honestly great for us because we
were take out, We were new, we were hot, that
we were the hot thing, and no one had anything
to do. So they would wait in their cars for
an hour back then to just to order. But they
had nothing else to do there playing on their phones
at home. So why they just play on your phone
the car while you're waiting for some food?
Speaker 2 (03:03):
There you go. So how does that bring us to
pizza today? Well? Very good. So you started messing around
with pizza, we.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
Yeah, Well actually started with the fried chicken sandwich that
you have a talk about that, all right, So that's
called the lawsuit.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
That's the that's the slider version of it.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
When we were I was bored because it was we
were curbside now and making bagels isn't fun. So I
made the fried chicken sandwich for my crew and they're like,
this is awesome. Why don't we put it on the menu.
And I'm like, well, we're a bagel shop. And then
we're like, but it's COVID rules don't matter anymore, right,
So we put the fried chicken sandwich on the menu,
and we had forty people outside an hour before we
opened to get it. They never had it, and then
(03:41):
word started spreading about the chicken sandwich. And I was
never a chef. I said, like, I came from a
band video production. I just happened to open this place
and I go for it.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I was a good cook. People came to my house
to eat, you know, but how'd you get to pizza?
From chicken sandwiches and bagels to pizza?
Speaker 3 (03:55):
So I wanted to start doing I got excited. So
I'm like, well, I make a good pasta. I make
a good this, right, And like I just keep adding
all these crazy things to the menu. And then I
was the head chef at that point. So there I
was cooking dinner, making the pastas, you know, doing the
pasta station, and I'm selling a ton of pasta and
I'm dying every single night, and I'm like, I've got
to spread this out. I got to get people to
buy something out. I want them to buy my pasta.
(04:15):
But I can't make a hundred pasta to night while
other people in the shops lines aren't as busy.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
So what if we had pizza to it?
Speaker 3 (04:21):
Maybe people will get some pizza some pasta, right obviously,
what if we add the caesar salad, maybe that the
cold sandwich line and salad line, they'll get a little
bit busier, right, So like spread it out so that
I don't die all at once.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Okay, he's dying slowly instead. So this cuzzi you brought
up today is world class pizza and you just got
the dough right in your in your opinion, yes and so.
And you're good friends with our friends at Buckie's. Sure
am shout out to do. It's like we're pizza people.
Speaker 4 (04:49):
Yeah, but you guys are friends.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
They're all like doing each other. We we yeah, we are.
Speaker 3 (04:55):
You know. We have a group chat with like twenty
different pizza shop owners and some of the best you
know around and we all just help each other out. Right.
So it's like someone's mixer breaks and you're like, hey,
you got a mixer guy. You know, someone runs out
of cheese because they had a busy weekend. It's like, hey,
does anybody have Grande cheese I can borrow? So yeah, no, Dom.
You know, Dom was much like me. He didn't come
from that. He was never in food. So he comes
to test out my oven. That's how I met him,
(05:16):
and I was like, dude, you're the best pizza that's
tested out the South.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
Maybe it's best not to come from food because you
just want to create your own. Okay, here, I'm looking
at some stuff about about bagels by Jar online Google reviews.
Are you ready? For this, I know they cannot. Sometimes
they're not very kind. You sorted by by one star,
because that's so much more so so you're talking about
starting out with bagels. Then here comes a chicken sandwich
and I saw chicken palm out there, yes, and now pizzas. Now,
(05:41):
this guy Nicholas says, best donut I ever had? What
the hell is going on down there? Just cereal doughnuts? Doughnuts?
Did I didn't?
Speaker 4 (05:58):
Insane?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
Okay, tell them about to say it's salad tastes incredible.
Tell them how much business you do with salad.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
So we have our manu literally has like three hundred
plus items on it, like it's stupid that it shouldn't
make any sense. That's the Lord's Caesar Salad, as we
call it, exactly right. The name makes complete sense to
you at this point.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
I love it.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
And for a menu with over three hundred items, that
salad accounts for five percent of our sales every single month.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
Salad, I'm gonna take it home. I'm gonna taste sadie
and stuff some in my purse.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Is incredible. You guys do a pizza out of that too.
We do the Lords Caesar Pizza Okay, now I have
to bring us up to current day. This is this
is the reason the reason Jarrett is here today. You
got a lot of exposure because of World Cup. That
is true. This is true. As a matter of fact,
West Orange is here, Montclair is here, and this is
(06:48):
where the Spa, the Spain players are staying. Right and
there in the Argentinas as well. Argententines were the Short
Hills Hilton. Okayway right. Norway stayed at the same hotel
as Spain. Yeah, right there, right there, right there, next door.
I used to live. I used to live in Llewellyn Park.
I know the area, very well haunted house not good. Interesting,
it's an interesting community. It is, thank you. Anyway. So
(07:11):
you got a call one day from the hotel, you know,
the chef at the hotel, and and he said, or
she said, uh what uh?
Speaker 3 (07:17):
He I had just gotten back from Mexico, was on
the family trip, and he messaged me and he said, hey,
I need to feed Norway pizza tomorrow after the game.
And I treated the entire country of Norway after the
game of med Life. And I had, like I guess,
I had like vacation bring going on. I was just like,
oh okay, like fine, and he's like, can you deliver
the I'm like, well, you know, we don't do our
(07:38):
own delivery. You gotta order online and then you know deliver,
which I literally said the door dasher with Dorway's pizzas,
I was, I just wasn't paying attention. And then I
was watching the Doorway games like why did I not
offer the deliver these pizzas myself?
Speaker 2 (07:50):
Like what Norway? They wrote? Wrote? Well, they got back
really late. That was way past my bedtime. Yeah. When
they win, they like to hang out at the stadium. Yeah, okay,
so you just a pizza order came in and it's
all World Cup related, yes, and then Spain.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Calls and then Spain calls and the coolest part about
it was, I've been working on my pizza dough for
five months about I wanted to switch it. I wanted
my dough to be better and better and better. And
Saturday morning, we actually took pizza out of the oven
and it was the best the pizza dough had been.
I literally like looked at my pizza guy. I high
five to him, like we nailed it. The pizza recipe
(08:25):
is done. We had taken every note every little thing
we did, the temperature of this, how long we mixed it,
for the speed on the mixer, every little piece to
making the dough. And an hour later we got the
message that Spain wanted pizzas.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
Okay, so you perfected your your your dough. Yes, sorry
Norway and Spain called, and then Spain calls, and then
these pizzas are incredible. Did bar pies are my favorite?
I got you, and but you have the Sicilian style,
you have the thick one, you have the regular ones,
and the flavors are insane. Okay, there's always two sides
to every story. Don't you love Google review? I love them.
(08:58):
This place is very over priced. I should have walked out.
Four dollars for a regular coffee, which wasn't large, twelve
dollars for breakfast sandwich on a bagel. It sounds like
normal to us. Only three choices of bagels and the
everything bagel had more seeds than bagel. I was passing through,
not local, would never go back, not long, and the
Jarrett replied, yes, you should have walked out. My staff
(09:23):
was telling me about how awful you were. Luckily I
wasn't there.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
Yeah, he's not in the area anyway, he's not coming back,
I know exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
But you know, we learned this here with people texting us.
The people can just sit out there in the dark
and type whatever they want and we'd never reply to them.
But sometimes you need to reply and go hey, look butthole. Yeah,
once in a while, you gotta do it. I've toned
it down a little bit from my younger punk rog
three hundred items on your menu. And this, by the way,
if you're just turning us on Jarrett Seltzer's here bagels
(09:54):
by Jarrett, of course, and donuts by Jarrett, and chicken
sandwiches by Jarrett and salvage by Jarrett. It goes on
IMPOSTA pizza is in frank incredible. So you've been on
ten ten wins, you've been on Channel seven. I mean
you've been They're all they're knocking on your doors and
just because you've fed a bunch of hockey players, uh
soccer play. Wait, did they send you like a picture
(10:15):
of like le mean yamal eating your pizza. They didn't.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
They sent me one picture of the pizzas being out
for Norway. It was like all I had And then
it's what every news network ran.
Speaker 4 (10:23):
With the same to get any feedback from them at all.
Speaker 2 (10:26):
Both times. Both times everything was finished.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
Okay, Norway crushed there is in twenty minutes, they said,
of course, Okay Norway.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
That brought their own food, Yes, because they thought American
They did somewhat, somewhat not not completely. See the news
stories where they brought their own food because they think
we're poisoning it with our food. Well, they hate and
they eat pretty healthy.
Speaker 3 (10:45):
Oh yeah, they did bring their own salmon that I
know a lot of U. I O s yeah uh text.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
As a resident of West Orange who's been following his journeys,
just the big beginning of his store, I can attest
to this place being amazing, amazing bagels, amazing pizza. The
chicken salad is to die for. Would you sell a
lot of chickens out?
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
You do? You know? Congratulations on everything. Thank you, Oh Sabina,
she coaches on the phone. Wait where do you Where
do you live in West Orange? Are you in Llewellen
Park as well with the haunted houses? I ain't there yet,
brot more pizzas. This is Sabina, She's your neighbor. Where
do you live? Sabina?
Speaker 1 (11:18):
I live in the Highlands. It's like townhouses that are
behind Eagle Rock and we've been ordering there since. Jarrett
had like the Papa that like a little bakery that
was off of main streets, and you had the stuffygles,
which were insanely bad for you as from a health perspective,
but they're delicious. I remember, this is one thing I wish.
(11:42):
I haven't had it in a while. But it was
called the Lawyer but everything.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
Why do you call it the lawsuit? You got sued
by someone?
Speaker 3 (11:50):
No, I called it the McChicken when I used to
make it for my friends and then sorry, I messed
that up and I got left. I called it the
mcjarrett's I'm an idiot. It was the mcjarrett and I'd
get sued. So we had because you have Mick on
the Jarrett.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Yeah, pleaz So Sabina, Sabina is here to stand for
you and say everything. You're making this pizza? Uh? What
was the one I had? It was it caramelized onion
and ricotta. You had the white roundish pie.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
We called it because I used to make the pizzas
and I couldn't make a round pie, so we called
them Roundish. Now I have great pizza, guys, but I
couldn't change the name, so the round pies are not roundish.
They're round, but they're called roundish.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
Okay, so good Sabina. Do you have a favorite pizza
over there?
Speaker 1 (12:28):
Oh? Bad, which is really bad because it's the camalized onion.
One is very good, but also just a plain one.
And I don't know the names off the my off
the top of my head because it's literally click click click.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Here's like a lot of weird, weird names. Creative.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Yeah, yeah, I'm just like, Okay, that has all the
ingredients I want. Cool, and there's a lot of stuff
on the menu, so it's just you just have to
know what you want and get out of there. Otherwise
you will have like decision fatigue.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
And you will not make any There's something to be
said for that, but it's all great stuff. Have you
ever thought about limiting the menu or would you get
too many complaints? I would get complaints because that's the
beauty of us, is that. Like if if Dad.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Wants chicken palm right, and Mom want Mom's gluten free
and wants Asian, and the kids want a pizza and
somebody like you can get all of it, and it's
all homemade, and it's all happens to be really good.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
Right.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Wow, you know it shouldn't work.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
It shouldn't Jared, can I Jared, can I ask you
a question?
Speaker 2 (13:23):
You may so.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
I'm on a sour dough journey right now. I've been
doing pretty good about it, and my kids love my
sour dough and I had some sour dough pizzas in
other places around Jersey and in the city. Are you
planning on your own menu?
Speaker 3 (13:38):
No sour dough for me. I'm leaving that to dom
over at BUCkies. I got enough issues on my bid. Yeah,
all right, so be We love you, Thank you for listening.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
We love you too so much.
Speaker 2 (13:51):
Have a great day. Tell her when West Orange we
said it, and welcome to ask a chef about sour dough. Yeah,
sowardough seemed to be always, so that's the thing. There's
room for everyone to do everything. Any questions for Jared
or thoughts.
Speaker 4 (14:04):
I just want to get more of salad. I've been
waiting for this.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
You want to shot up to We're loving reading the reply.
Your replies on Google reviews are hilarious. You are good yelp,
you are a saucy, sassy little winch.
Speaker 4 (14:20):
Are you normally assaulting them?
Speaker 2 (14:23):
I worked really hard.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
There's like twenty five people that rely on me to
feed their families, So don't have me because I'd make
three types of bagels.
Speaker 5 (14:30):
Somebody left a one star review and blah blah blah blah.
They're thinking you food is just mediocre. Your reply was this,
not sure what you ordered, but calling our food mediocre
while every other review you leave is also negative, makes
me think the common ingredient here may not be the restaurant.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
Amen. That's awesome. Thank you is awesome.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
We need to hire him part time to answer our technic.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
Oh you you would have a field. You deserve more
than a four point four People downvoted you, and we
got to get those scores up to a full point
scores or anything to him, scores to us or nothing. Well,
some people read that. Yeah, it's tough. It's an interesting world,
the review world. We did once.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
Actually, we yelped I had some of the issues with yelp,
so we ran a contest that you had to leave
a one star review for us on Yelp, but you
had to the review had to be amazing, and then
you had to justify why you were leaving the one
star And I said, I'll give one hundred dollars gift
cards whoever writes the best one, and like one hundred.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
Something, what was the best one? I'd have to look honestly, Yeah, yeah,
yelp with the feeling they didn't like the feeling of
the toilet paper or something like that. One star. Everyone
loves a one star review. There's so much more fun
to read.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
So let's make a game out of its brilliant stars.
Speaker 4 (15:47):
First, exactly tell me everything.
Speaker 3 (15:49):
Emailed me that they were going to take away my
access to my own accounts.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
So Begel's by Jarrett. Jarrett Seltzer's here uh in West Orange.
The pizza were loving the story with UH World Cup incredible. Now.
We met Jarrett years ago nineteen thirty two thousand and four.
We had a contest called Radio Star or something like
that where local bands could send in their submissions. Jarrett
(16:14):
was in a band called Houston Calls. I was you
played with the bass barely but yes, terrible bass. I
know if you made it into the finals, didn't you.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
When you play bass every single day, you can like
fake it till you make it.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
But I was. I was by far the worst musician
bad so the name of the song was called Exit Emergency. Yep,
do you remember this song?
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (16:35):
Of course I remember you. Hear the bass and listen,
tell it sounds like a band I've heard before.
Speaker 3 (16:51):
Kill.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Your bass is really booming in there. I like that
saying do you miss those days?
Speaker 4 (17:02):
Wouldn't I think you should play at the restaurant.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
I'm telling you, I'm I'm so bad. That's the beauty.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
He reunited a few years ago. I had to have
my tab on stage. I practiced for like a month,
and I still suck.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
That's okay. Do you know what when you started pizza,
it wasn't the best. I'm sure now it is the best.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
Well, it took forty years to figure out what I
was actually good at. Oh, I did think you guys
were gonna blow us up. I was like, David Brody's
gonna make me famous. This is gonna be amazing. Didn't
didn't work out that way? Your friends your friends with Brody? Right,
I am okay, because because you you have shades of
Brody in you, I can ye. I mean, when Brody
(17:42):
worked with us, he would stay on these text messages
and he would get so burt hurt over but hurt
over everything people say, and he would always entwer them
and he never did say who it was. But if
ever you've been yelled at on our on our text messages,
it was brody.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Yeah, he took a liking to our band.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
And you know radio was for music was that much
bigger back then, obviously, right, So I was.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
Like, this guy's gonna get me on Z one hundred,
like this is it. We're gonna be the next clink lady.
It just played you again. Yeah, look at that. Look
at that twenty years later, look at that. Look congratulations, Jared,
thank you, And I can't wait to come in. I'm
gonna sit down and look at that three hundred menu menu,
item menu. Jeez. But I haven't even tried to parm yet,
and that's he needs to try the parm. I meant,
(18:25):
Birdie told me last night that your a parm got
I'm has brought you apart.
Speaker 1 (18:28):
Isn't Bobby Brown's hotel the Georgia, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Yeah, yeah, it's it's a very stately hotel now in
the middle of Claire. Well class for me, what you're
trying to say, yes, that's what he's talk. I didn't
say that. Look at me anyway. H congratulations, thank you,
and you know what, and when these stories pop on
you know, local and on the networks and things like
that about those spizza guy in West Orange fed the
(18:53):
soccer players good, you know what. Whatever we can do
to get your name out there. Now you're with us,
that's awesome talk.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
I would love for Portnray to come by sometime. Hopefully
this put us on his radar.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
A little bit. We might do it absolutely, but this
pizza is fantas I can't wait to go in and
gobble down on someone. Well, I'll tell you. We make
all of our pasta in house.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
We grind our own burger meat for our burgers like
we were the real deal.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
We make. Most of our condiments are homemade, some of them.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Sometimes you need craft ranch like that's fine, but most
of our condiments are even homemade.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
So we we take it seriously. We mess around and
congratulations on everything. Thank you. I appreciate it. With Jared
of course from Bingeals by Jared. Thanks for coming into
this
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