{"id":477633,"date":"2026-09-27T19:26:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-27T19:26:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/477633\/"},"modified":"2026-09-27T19:26:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-27T19:26:11","slug":"joshua-tree-bagel-locker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/477633\/","title":{"rendered":"Joshua Tree bagel locker"},"content":{"rendered":"

Along Highway 62 in Joshua Tree, a stack of high school lockers<\/a> holds something the High Desert was missing: a real New York-style bagel.<\/p>\n

For that, you have DIY baker Richard Lee to thank.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want a bagel. What do I do?\u201d Lee remembered thinking after moving to Twentynine Palms in 2023 from Los Angeles, where he had lived for more than a decade.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The Bagel Portal off Highway 62 in Joshua Tree.<\/p>\n

(<\/p>\n

Richard Lee<\/p>\n

\/<\/p>\n

Courtesy 29 Loaves<\/p>\n

)<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t just any bagel the born-and-raised New Yorker was craving, but the kind from back home that gives \u201ca little crunch\u201d when you bite into its crust \u2014 with a \u201cchewy, softer\u201d inside and a taste Lee calls \u201cineffable.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLike maybe a sourdough or an Italian bread,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Taught by YouTube, tested by family in New York<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Richard Lee converted his garage in 29 Palms to make bagels.<\/p>\n

A tinkerer by nature, Lee launched 29 Loaves<\/a> in early 2024, bringing bagels he handcrafts in his licensed home operation to Twentynine Palms, Joshua Tree and surrounding communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cI went to the culinary school of YouTube,\u201d he said, having watched more than 100 videos on how to make a bagel. At first, he relied on his own taste buds as a guide, before sending his creations to his family in New York to taste.<\/p>\n

After months of overnight shipping, Lee said, \u201cEven a UPS store is asking me, \u2018Why are you doing that?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI know it makes no sense,\u201d he told them. \u201cThat’s how I operate.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

29 Loaves serves up New York-style bagels to Joshua Tree and other desert communities.<\/p>\n

Eventually, his sister gave the thumbs-up. To be extra, extra, extra sure, Lee went to folks living in the desert with New York ties to get their blessing.<\/p>\n

\u201cAttention is an ingredient,\u201d Lee said of his bagels. It\u2019s a philosophy he\u2019s honed while running his other business providing IT services, which he now operates remotely.<\/p>\n

\u201cGarbage in, garbage out,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you make a mistake or something falls on the bagel and marks it, it\u2019ll end up that way as a finished product.\u201d<\/p>\n

Why bagels mean so much to him<\/p>\n

Lee, whose father is Korean and mother is Brazilian, said his bakery is ultimately about food memories \u2014 and draws inspiration from what he ate growing up. The only other baked good 29 Loaves sells is p\u00e3o de queijo, a gluten-free Brazilian cheese puff he makes.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Richard Lee handmakes New York-style bagels at his home operation.<\/p>\n

But nothing rivals bagels. Sundays were often bagel days in his childhood home in the Long Island suburbs. As a teenager working for his father, Lee remembered they would make detours off the Long Island Expressway to grab fresh bagels.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were nice and plump, and they were so hot,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Father and son would eat them straight out of the bag \u2014 no cream cheese, no nothing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose were the types of memories that I wanna bring here,\u201d Lee said.<\/p>\n

Get your bagel<\/p>\n

You can find 29 Loaves bagels in select cafes and markets in desert communities, including Indian Wells, Palm Desert and Pioneertown. Lee himself delivers orders within Twentynine Palms and Joshua Tree.<\/p>\n

For a 24\/7 hankering, there\u2019s The Bagel Portal<\/a>, at 61877 29 Palms Highway, Joshua Tree \u2014 look for a stack of lockers under a wooden A-frame in the parking lot facing the highway. You\u2019ll get a combination code after making a purchase.<\/p>\n

Go to the website<\/a> to order.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Along Highway 62 in Joshua Tree, a stack of high school lockers holds something the High Desert was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":477634,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[48,52,51,47,50,49],"class_list":["post-477633","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=477633"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477633\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/477634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=477633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=477633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=477633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}