7 minute read
Joy to Be Held
For Jeff and Danielle Perera, happiness is a warm bagel. Now they share their passion with the community.
Story: Mark McWaters / Photos: Fred Lopez
After a bout with illness as a young child, there was only one thing Danielle Perera wanted: bagels. Those fat rounds of fresh-baked goodness were all her parents could get her to eat for years.“Bagels were just joy,” Danielle says. “Saturday mornings, we would head out on a bagel run, and Mom would hand me a warm bag of bagels in the back seat. They were always special to me. They meant family, and love.”
Danielle Perera pictured at 3 years old
Photo courtesy of Jeff & Danielle Perera
—Danielle Perera
Danielle, co-owner of Jeff’s Bagel Run in Ocoee alongside her husband Jeff, has a bagful of bagel memories to draw upon.
Jeff and Danielle have been in love for most of their lives. Bagel love came first, of course. Growing up immersed in the bagel culture of New York, how could it not? It would be several years—and countless bagel shmears later— before the two of them would meet and fall in love with each other.
They married, had two children, and eventually made their home in Florida—far from anything resembling what they were used to in the bagel capital of the world.
Still, they persevered. Jeff pursued a rewarding career in retail, and Danielle worked in operations on the corporate side. While they couldn’t bring bagels from New York, they certainly brought their bagel appetites.
Like many for whom bagels are a special love, Jeff and Danielle were in a constant search for the perfect bagel. They traveled everywhere, starting closer to home and branching out, widening their search, until they finally found a place in Winter Park that almost met their standards. Only one problem: the trip to score that almost-worthy bagel took 45 minutes. One way!
They accepted their lot and swallowed their yearnings along with those bagels until fate—and COVID-19—intervened. Jeff and Danielle, like the rest of America, twisted and turned in the turmoil of the pandemic. Jeff lost his job, and Danielle kept their family afloat on her salary alone. They made do waiting until something better came along.
That something better sprang from an idle comment Jeff made during one of the bagel runs they still made to Winter Park— “Man, this is a long way to go for a bagel.”
Danielle, in a flash of inspiration, answered back and solved two problems with one brilliant observation. “You could learn to make them.”
She said it, not really expecting Jeff to transform into a bagel-baking phenomenon, but more to give him a hobby. She was concerned that pandemic-induced idleness would drive the normally active Jeff a little bonkers. So, Jeff would get something to keep him occupied and focused. And who knows? They might end up with bagels they could actually enjoy.
Jeff took to the challenge with the drive and determination that had made him a standout in his career. He pored over everything he could find online, read countless recipes and articles. He became more obsessed than even Danielle had ever been.
Finally, eager to put all his newfound wisdom to the test, Jeff began to bake. And at first, what he made were, according to Danielle, “really awful bagels.” But undeterred by bagels that might find better uses as doorstops, he kept at it. He tried new recipes. He experimented, swapping out ingredients, varying boiling times. (Bagels are literally the only bread that must be boiled before it’s baked.) He boiled them for 45 seconds, 60 seconds, 90 seconds, and two minutes. Every time he finished, he made copious notes about each attempt. He varied baking times and made more notes.
Danielle watched the process, and wanted to help where she could. So, with her specialty in operations and spreadsheets (which she loves making almost as much as bagels),she jumped in and began locating hard-to-find ingredients and little-known sources for baking supplies the pandemic made harder to come by.
Jeff's first attempt at making bagels.
Photo courtesy of Jeff & Danielle Perera
After weeks and weeks of trial and error, “awful” slowly became less awful, and Jeff began gaining confidence. He began thinking this batch, or maybe that batch, had possibilities. Every time he hit upon a maybe, he’d confidently tell Danielle, “This is the one!” She would just as confidently reply,”No, sorry hon, no it isn’t.” Then it happened.
“I will never forget the day,” he says. “That one, incredible day. It’s my favorite story.”
He handed Danielle a bagel and said, “This is the one.”
“I’ve heard that before,” she said. And bit into the bagel.
Jeff smiles, the memory fresh as one of his warm bagels. “Her eyes roll back in her head, she’s holding the bagel with both hands, and an expression of pure joy and bliss comes over her face.”
“I swear I was a kid again, in the back seat of my
mother’s Volvo,” says Danielle. “I couldn’t believe it. All I could think was, ‘wow, this is a really good bagel!’”
To prove this miraculous bagel was no fluke, they baked another batch. Then another. They baked two and three batches of bagels a day, for days. They had so many bagels they gave them away to friends, neighbors, and acquaintances.
Until one day, one of those lucky friends chewed and swallowed and said: “Hey, you know, you should sell these!”
And sell they did, at neighborhood markets, at bagel pop-ups, to anyone and everyone in search of the perfect bagel. They sold them in very small batches, two and four at a time.
Jeff would deliver them, driving out to Clermont or wherever to make a sale and make a customer. They grew a loyal online following of joyful bagel heads who gleefully snapped up whatever bagel inventory the husband and wife could crank out.
Jeff finally devised “bagel drops” where he’d announce an upcoming batch of bagels online that would be available for purchase at a specific date and time. They sold out their entire inventory regularly, often in less than a minute. What took Jeff a day to make would be gone in 45 seconds.
Something had to change. They needed more refrigeration, more oven space, a better mixer. (Jeff totally trashed four of KitchenAid’s best home mixers.) They simply needed to upgrade everything they had. So Danielle put together a Kickstarter campaign for some crowdfunding help, setting a goal of $10,000.
They achieved that goal in three hours. By the end of it, they’d signed up 264 backers—46 at the $100 level—and reaped a total of $23,000. It would buy them an industrial-sized mixer, plenty of refrigeration, and new professional ovens.
Most mornings you can find the early birds lined up to get their fresh-baked bagels.
Fitting all that into their home and garage was out, so they began the hunt for a suitable location. Enter the new storefront in Ocoee, Jeff’s Bagel Run.
Meanwhile, Danielle started feeling a little bit jealous. The pure joy that put a smile on Jeff’s face every day as he kneaded, rolled, cut, and baked his bagels did not go unnoticed. Danielle pulled in a very generous six-figure income from her job and yet, she was miserable. Bagels, her lifetime love since childhood, had become Jeff’s love. The joy bagels had always brought her had become Jeff’s joy.
After much soul searching,countless family discussions, and spreadsheet budgets that examined every plus and minus, Danielle answered the siren smell of fresh-baked deliciousness. She resigned her position and jumped into Jeff’s Bagel Run with arms spread wide and a smile spread even wider. She sleeps better now and gets up every morning to embrace her joy right alongside her husband.
Jeff is quick to point out that this is a 50/50 partnership and that they wouldn’t be able to do what they do now without the two of them pursuing their bagel dreams together.
Danielle makes the dough, lets it rise, and cuts it. Jeff rolls the dough and bakes it. They make in a day what used to take them a week. And they are still in love—most importantly with one another, and now with their beloved bagels.
As for the joy? We’ll let Jeff and Danielle answer that one themselves:
“I am a very lucky man. I have Danielle, I have our children, and I have bagels. That, my friend, is true joy.”
Danielle puts it more succinctly. “I like to think we are bringing joy to our community. Warm, delicious bagel joy in a bag.”
Jeff’s Bagel Run / Wed-Sun, 7:30 a.m.–1 p.m. (But you better get there early to get one—they usually sell out by 11!)
—Jeff Perera
