The east side’s tradition of old school New York City bagels continues, thanks to the new Anything Bagel!
Although we’re lucky to have some great bagels in Columbus, the closure of Block’s Bagels left a, well, bagel-shaped hole in our culinary landscape. After all, Block’s was amongst the first to bring New York City bagels to Columbus. But now that hole has been filled by Anything Bagel, which is using Block’s original recipes!
Backing up briefly… Harold Block first opened his deli and cafe in 1967 on East Broad Street. The Block family, having moved from New York City, noticed a lack of proper bagels in central Ohio, so they started their own deli. They operated a store on East Broad Street (here it is back in 2014!) and a cafe in the McNaughten Center, where they baked all their bagels.
They moved their original deli closer in toward Bexley on East Broad Street in 2018. In later years their son Steve ran the cafes; he passed away in 2022. And Harold passed away early in 2026. In the intervening years, the East Broad location was sold and became Fox Bagels & Deli (with a companion stall in North Market). Finally, the last Block’s location on McNaughten closed and briefly became part of Marx Bagels out of Cincinnati. But eventually that closed, too, and now owner TJ Burkheart and baker Derek Hickey have revamped it into Anything Bagel.
While the space has been given a slight refresh, it still retains the feel of the old delis, with the long counters, baskets of fresh bagels, rows of booths, and the dining room with curving glass ceilings.
You can also feel, just stepping inside, that this part of Columbus is so heavily steeped in the history and routines of these old school bagel shops. While we visited Anything Bagel, we overheard multiple people share stories at the counter, usually starting with, “I’ve been getting bagels here for years…”
And the even better news is that the bagels are still great! We took a half dozen home (where they lasted barely a day) and enjoyed sandwiches in the deli.
My favorite of the bunch: the Vira Walker with thinly sliced corned beef, egg, hash brown, and American cheese. We got that on a garlic and herb bagel.
Big props to The Nova LOX on everything. It’s, well, everything you want in this classic: smoked salmon, cream cheese, red onion, and capers.
Anything Bagel serves a full menu of drip coffee, espresso drinks, and specialty lattes. We enjoyed our iced vanilla cloud latte with vanilla and cloud foam.
And overall it’s comforting to know they’re doing justice by Block’s old recipes. You’ll easily be enticed by the baskets full of bagels.
Warning: gratuitous photos of bagels ahead.
On our visit, we were fortunate to meet owner TJ Burkheart. He and the head baker Derek both have experience working for Block’s and Marx Bagels, and they jumped at the chance to continue the business when Marx Bagels closed up.
TJ also told us about their Bake It Forward program, where they’ll donate proceeds from special bagels every month to local charities.
I wish we lived a little closer to Anything Bagel, but it’s probably for the best that they’re not right next door!
If you sneak around back, you’ll see reminders of the building’s long history as Block’s Bagels.
Anything Bagel is open every day but Tuesday, 6 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Anything Bagel
6115 McNaughten Ctr.
Columbus, OH 43232
(614) 604-7338
Web: anythingbagel.com
FB: Anything Bagel
IG: @anythingbagel_
