Bagels News
Dallas' Starship Bagel releases Rocky-esque video for national competition
![Starship bagels](https://dallas.culturemap.com/media-library/starship-bagels.jpg?id=32999675&width=2000&height=1500&quality=65&coordinates=0%2C3%2C0%2C4)
Eye of the Bagel.
Dallas' top bagel shop Starship Bagel is participating in the 2023 edition of New York BagelFest, taking place in New York October 21-22, competing against more than two dozen bagel bakers from around the world.
BagelFest is a celebration dedicated to all things bagel, with bagels, bagel sandwiches, speakers, games, photo ops, and demonstrations — all climaxed by "The Best Bagel" contest with more than two dozen contestants from around the world. Starship — rated the best bagel in Dallas — is the only bagel shop from Texas to compete.
In preparation for the event, Starship founder Oren Salomon is currently in residence at Bagel Market, a small chain in New York who've lent their kitchen to become Starship's temporary headquarters.
Salomon brought a team of five to help produce the bagels he'll serve over the course of the two-day event. "We're tasked with making 800 samples per day," Salomon says.
They'll be serving menu highlights including a bagel and schmear; the Millennial Falcon with choice of schmear, plus smashed avocado, tomato, pickled red onion, sprouts, and red pepper; and Supernova Lox, topped with Acme Nova Lox, tomato, cucumber, red onion, and capers.
"We’re also doing a collaboration at the event with New School American cheese, where we'll be serving a bagel grilled cheese on our Italian bagel," Salomon says.
Part of the competition entailed the making of a video: It's called "Eye of the Bagel" - a parody of "Eye of the Tiger," the song by Survivor.
For the video portion, Salomon used portions of a documentary about Starship shot as part of a WFAA series. For the soundtrack, he enlisted a top musical team headed by award-winning recording, mixing, and mastering engineer and producer Michael Briggs of Civil Audio in Denton.
Briggs is a regular at the original location of Starship in Lewisville. "I'm picky about bagels, and Starship has the best in Texas," Briggs says. "Whenever I go in, I stand by the oven so I can get one fresh."
Briggs recruited Mills Chaiken on guitar and Dean Adams on drums - "my usual studio session musicians," he says.
The greatest challenge was finding the right singer to recreate the distinctive vocal style of original Survivor singer David Bickler, and it was a flash of genius: Leah Lane, the epic singer-guitarist of Dallas alt-rock band Rosegarden Funeral Party. A girl!
"It's a great cover, and Leah killed it on vocals," Briggs says.
They all collaborated, including Salomon, on the lyrics:
"It felt Rocky-esque, like you’re training for this Olympic level challenge," Salomon says.