Since I’m good for a bagel once or twice a week, I rotate between these places (in no particular order or pattern):
- Planet Bagel (Keyport)-- weird, awkward service with great bagels and awful coffee
- Hole Lotta Bagels (Middletown)-- great service, solid bagels, decent coffee
- Holmdel Bagels (Holmdel)-- great service, great coffee, smallish bagels and a little too light on the seeds, and never enough butter
Today I actually tried Bagel Boyz in Hazlet on Bethany Road for the first time. They appeared to be relatively new. Aside from an energy behind the counter that you could cut with a knife–an employee was scolded by another employee for writing the wrong abbreviation down on her order pad (apparently she wrote “B” for butter when it should have been “Bu” 
)-- it was a solid toasted everything (and quite large) with just the right amount of butter. I am rarely up that way, though.
