Think of Jerusalem's venerable Old City: its profound significance to three major religious faiths, its archways and alleys of golden stone, its holy men and its hucksters, its jarring clash between the values of the ancient world and the modern world, age-old conflicts playing themselves out in only a few square kilometers. Now try to think of a food that serves as the appropriate complement to the heavy historical and religious burden the Old City carries. If you thought of anything other than bagels, you're wrong.

Yes, for when the inevitable desire for a bagel strikes in the midst of the Old City's onslaught of weighty significance, there's Jewish Quarter landmark Bonkers Bagels. The priestly family who occupied the Burnt House during the Second Temple period probably never imagined one day a bagel shop would spring up across the street. Bonkers serves up a variety of bagel flavors for home-starved Diaspora Jews (and bagel-appreciating gentiles) with all the requisite toppings from lox to...well, cream cheese. They even do catering.