• LISA DEWEY, a Jewish woman who has lived in Flushing (a neighborhood in Queens) and Great Neck on Long Island and complains that she can’t find a good salt bagel in Maine. Dewey lives in Portland and works in the Portland Press Herald’s advertising department.

• MICHAEL JUBINSKY, co-owner of Stone Turtle Baking and Cooking School in Lyman, who makes bagels for his family, has taught aspiring bakers the difference between kneading and stretch-and-fold, and in 2011 was crowned one of the Top 10 Bread Bakers in America by Dessert Professional magazine.

• DAVID LEVI, chef/owner of Vinland and Trattoria Fanny. Levi, who is half Jewish, swears by H&H Bagels and Tal Bagels in Manhattan, and Bergen Bagels in his old Park Slope neighborhood in Brooklyn. Levi was joined by his girlfriend and fellow bagel connoisseur, ELIZABETH LOUDEN. The couple live on Portland’s West End.

• JAY LEVINE, a commodities broker and self-proclaimed “token New York Jew” who grew up on H&H Bagels and Ess-a-Bagel in Manhattan. He now lives in Brunswick.

• ALISON PRAY, co-founder of Standard Baking Co. and resident of Portland. She doesn’t make bagels, but customers say her baguettes and croissants taste as if they were baked in heaven – or Paris, anyway.

• CLIFF SCHECHTMAN, executive editor of the Portland Press Herald, who grew up in New York and claims he is able to tell whether a deli makes real bagels just by walking in the door. (“You can smell it,” he said.) Schechtman lives in Pownal.