Pigeon Bagels, with its cult following, is opening in Squirrel Hill next week

A lot of Pittsburghers have tried (and loved) Pigeon Bagels, but few have enjoyed them straight from the oven.

That’s about to change.

Within the next week, the popular pop-up bakery is opening a brick-and-mortar store at 5614 Hobart St. in Squirrel Hill.

“I’ve enjoyed plenty of hot, fresh-out-of-the-oven bagels and now I’m able to invite people in and serve them food right,” says owner Gabrielle “Gab” Taube.

The space, a former laundromat, is less than 1,000 square feet and will be kosher and takeout only. It will be open every day from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Customers can choose from a variety of bagels (plain, sesame, garlic and sea salt, poppy and everything) topped with schmears (such as fig and honey, beet, ramp, jalapeno-cashew and tofu). Other menu items include sandwiches such as the Vegan Lox made with smoked carrot lox, red onions, capers and a tofu schmear.

Redhawk Coffee from nearby Oakland will supply the caffeine. Eventually, homemade soups will be added to the list.

Taube, which is the German word for “pigeon,” began making bagels at home several years ago using simple ingredients. The 27-year-old went to school for environmental science, but food – particularly fun, casual eats – lured her into the culinary world.

Her round, no-frills creations became so popular among her friends and family that she moved the late-night production to A’Pizza Badamo in Mt. Lebanon, where she worked tossing pies.

From 2:30 to 6 a.m. she rolled, proofed, boiled and baked the bagels by hand and then hit the road distributing the goods to nearly two dozen local coffee shops, markets and restaurants. From Pear and the Pickle in Troy Hill to Espresso a Mano in Lawrenceville, customers were gobbling the bread faster than Taube could make it.

She started doing pop-ups at local farmer’s markets, running herself ragged on weekends when she sold up to 900 bagels. Once the Hobart St. site opens, the pop-ups will stop, although wholesale deliveries will continue.

Taube is happy to settle into a permanent location just a few blocks away from busy Murray Avenue. Her family is from the neighborhood, so it’s a homecoming of sorts.

“My whole nuclear family will be working for me by the time we open,” she says with a laugh.