At Collis Cafe, fresh bagels are in limited supply. By around 9:30 a.m., they’re often sold out, replaced by store-bought alternatives that many students immediately recognize. The difference in quality, and the speed at which the originals disappear, has turned these bagels into one of the most sought-after parts of campus breakfast. But behind that daily sellout is a process most students never see, and a baker whose work begins long before anyone gets in line.
Christopher Calvin’s path to becoming the primary bagel supplier for Collis began all the way back in high school. Nearly five decades ago — when he was 16 — he started making bagels as “an after-school job on weekends,” he said. After leaving his college architecture program to attend culinary school, Calvin spent years working as a pastry chef in New York City, eventually becoming the executive pastry chef at the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan. In the early ’90s, he moved to the Upper Valley with his partner in search of a different pace of life. After working multiple part-time jobs, including a brief stint working as a chef at Collis, Calvin opened his own bakery, The Baker’s Studio.
For 18 years, Calvin ran his storefront in White River Junction, producing french pastries, bread and cakes. Bagels only became a staple later as a way to boost business.
“I knew how to do it; the equipment was really cheap,” Calvin explained. “I thought my business was lagging. So I turned the business into a cafe with bagels.”
Eventually, faced with staffing challenges and exhausted by the long hours, he shifted again to an independent wholesale operation run entirely out of his own home. Today, Calvin bakes and delivers around 1,200 bagels a day all over the Upper Valley, including the Co-op stores, Lucky’s Coffee Garage and the Woodstock Farmers Market. His schedule is packed: a typical workday stretching 10 to 12 hours, six days a week.
“I was up at 11 o’clock last night,” Calvin said. “I come in and I have the dough made from the day before. I start baking, and then I pack, and then I deliver.”
Outside of the time commitment, it’s physically demanding work. Oftentimes, Calvin will have sleepless nights. It’s difficult to produce good bagels all the time. Even after decades of experience, variables like temperature, humidity and flour quality make each batch slightly different. The “biggest problem,” according to Calvin, is “consistency”.
“As the weather changes, the [dough doesn’t] come out the same,” he explained. “If it’s cold outside, then your dough doesn’t want to come up. Every day you’re adjusting.”
Attention to detail is part of what distinguishes Calvin’s bagels.
“I boil them and then they’re baked on the hearth in the oven,” Calvin said. “So they have more of a crust than other bagels.”
Students notice this difference, even if they don’t always know why. While Ethan Park ’29 described himself as “not a morning person,” but hearing about the bagels was enough to convince him to give them a try.
“The plain bagel especially was very soft, much softer than a regular bagel — it tasted fresh,” Park said.
For Park, that sense of freshness stood out in contrast to store-bought alternatives.
“One thing I really hate about most bagels is that they just kind of feel like hard bread,” Park said. “But these bagels taste much softer… [the bagel] not being this hard thing that’s difficult to chew is nice.”
The everything bagel, which is Calvin’s best selling product, also stands out for the quality of the flavor.
“I love everything seasoning, and this is some great everything seasoning,” Park said.
For other students, the bagels are less of a novelty and more of a daily staple. Katharina Mueller ’27, who eats breakfast at Collis nearly every morning, has developed a daily routine of getting two eggs and cheese on an everything bagel. Beyond the food itself, her experience is shaped by a sense of connection with the Collis community.
“I’ve really befriended all of the workers there,” Mueller said. “I really like saying ‘hi’ to them, catching up with them in the mornings.”
Still, she notes that not all bagels at Collis are created equal. Because the dining hall supplements its supply with store-bought options once the fresh ones run out, students can tell the difference.
“They run out of the homemade bagels by about 9:25 a.m.,” Mueller said. “That’s another 35 minutes of Collis breakfast without good bagels.”
That kind of consistent demand doesn’t go unnoticed by Calvin.
“I enjoy that people like my product,” Calvin said. “I see the same people every week and they’ll say, ‘Oh, that was great.’ I mean, that’s rewarding.”
While most students may never see the process behind each bagel, they experience its results daily in the texture, taste and reliability of food made with care. The bagels may sell out quickly, but the reason they do is simple: People notice the difference.
