Once sprawling Finagle A Bagel now down to just two outlets

Finagle A Bagel has quietly closed its Test Kitchen on Rowe Street in Newton's Auburndale neighborhood, leaving it with just two nosheries - on Boylston Street in Copley Square and at Mass. General.

At its peak, the chain, founded in 1991, had 21 outlets in the Boston area. But in 2008, the couple who had bought the chain ten years earlier decided to ease out of direct retail sales, even unique bagel places with conveyor belts, and concentrate on bulk bagel baking for retailers across the country seeking white-label bagels.

The original owner was famous for shlepping a pail of Boston water from his Faneuil Hall shop to New York with which to make some bagels to disprove jaded New Yorkers who claimed that what made New York bagels so good was New York City water. At a New York bagel place, he made two batches of bagels, one with Hub water, the other with New York tap - and nobody could tell the difference.