For Nick Cignarella, the perfect breakfast was not a Florida sunrise or a swaying palm tree; it was the distinct, chewy crunch of a real bacon, egg and cheese on a New York toasted bagel.
His uncle, Jeff Cofini, traded the frigid Bronx cold and concrete jungle for South Florida’s warm weather and sandy shores. Cofini brought years of business experience from New York, including his own recipes and baking style.
“Over the years, Nick was always in my ear saying, ‘You know, let’s do something, let’s do something,’ and I would tell him he was crazy,” Cofini said.
Cignarella took an interest in his uncle’s passion for baking. Though he lacked experience running a bagel shop, he saw family ties as the key ingredient.
“I’d come down here and visit, and there was nowhere to get breakfast,” Cignarella said. “You know, I’m living in New York all this time, and there was nowhere to get that standard breakfast I would get on the weekends.”
Rather than settle, he decided to open the real thing — with the one whose bagels he already trusted.
“Zio means ‘uncle’ in Italian. Since this is something I wanted to come down here and do, I just thought it would mean the most if, you know, it’s my uncle’s bagels,” Cignarella said. “So, us being an Italian family, you know, Zio’s Bagels, Uncle’s Bagels.”
In June 2023, Zio’s NY Bagel & Deli Co. opened, bringing a taste of the Big Apple to Tampa, Florida.
Cignarella and Cofini dismiss one of New York’s most cherished culinary myths with a laugh: “You know, coming down here all you heard was ‘New York water.’ People in Florida would go to New York and bring down water and bread because of the water.”