College Food

[elyse]

I can bring you ... wait a second... you'll purchase Capn' Crunch IF I bring you a present? Only if you buy me a beer.

[SobaAddict70]

sure.

cool beans!

Soba

[Lady T]

At the time I attended, the Chicago "concrete campus" of the University of Illinois had been built in a wonderful old Italian neighborhood; in fact and unfortunately, a sizable chunk of that neighborhood was condemned and razed by the City to build it. I rarely, if ever, went to the campus cafeterias (though the Behavioral Sciences Building -- BSB for short -- had superb grilled cheeseburgers!), because the pickings were so good in the 'hood just off campus.

I still go back now and then to get a sub sandwich from the original Fontano's -- the salami-and-provolone with mild peppers is one of the wonders of the world.

[NeroW]

I can't remember what the food was like in the dorms at Western Michigan University.

I don't think I ever went into the cafeteria, except to steal trays to sled down the hill on, and one other time when we captured a squirrel and set it loose during lunch.

You should have heard them all screaming.

The squirrel jumped out one of the (low) windows and scampered off into the bushes, never to be seen again.

[LittleMissCrepe]

Mediocre dorm food is an indispensible part of American college life. A couple years of powdered scrambled eggs, wilted veggies and mystery meat languishing under heat lamps makes the first transition to apartment living that much sweeter! I graduated from Northwestern University in June. We had Sodexho Marriot; they were quite receptive to student feedback (at least in my dorm dining hall) and tried hard to give a range of choices. Still, I survived mostly on ice cream, bagels, cereal, Rice Krispie treats and chicken a la king - supplemented by the typical late-night diet of Papa John's breadsticks.

Colleges seem much more receptive these days to accomodating all students, especially vegetarians and vegans. At Northwestern, the dining halls served "tofurkey" right before Thanksgiving!

Dining hall food is rarely good (Wheaton College and University of Michigan are supposed to be amazing, however), but I think mandatory meal plans are a good idea. I got to know my dorm mates amazingly well over looong meals as we procrasinated from going back upstairs to do homework. And at some NU dorms, professors will brave the bad food to grab lunch with students.

[fresco]

Bloviatrix provided a link earlier in this thread to a NYT story about Alice Waters teaming up with Yale, where her daughter is a student, in an experiment to see whether food for college kids could be locally sourced, nutritious, and tasty. Here's a link to the same story that doesn't require you to go through the NYT registration system to read it:

http://www.iht.com/articles/106966.html

[anil]

My freshman year in Cambridge I lived almost exclusively on three things: Whopper Jr.s or BLTs from the food court or falafel from the falafel truck on Mass Ave, still the best falafel I've ever had.  ......

Mass Ave. ? Where ? circa which yr ?

MIT, 95-96.

Edited to add that the Falafel truck was right in front of 77 Mass Ave. There were two, and I believe still are- I used to eat there when I moved back to Boston in 98-00, though I sadly can't remember which one was the better one.

Course 4 '85 Media Lab was called Architecture Machine Group in my days - Towards the end IMPei's building opened ..... Oh Well !

[gknl]

Bloviatrix provided a link  earlier in this thread to a NYT story about Alice Waters teaming up with Yale, where her daughter is a student,  in an experiment to see whether food for college kids could be locally sourced, nutritious, and tasty. Here's a link to the same story that doesn't require you to go through the NYT registration system to read it:

http://www.iht.com/articles/106966.html

There's an article in this month's "Food and Wine" (it was free) about how much she suffered with the dorm food. I think it was supposed to be flattering. . . . .

[Carlovski]

I started a similar discussion in the UK forum Here

Durham was fairly unusual in still having 3 meal a day catering and little choice.

The colleges varied in quality though (Even though everyone payed the same - same with rooms, a Historic room in Durham castle - yep, you could live in the Castle!, a nice big brand new en-suite in one of the newer colleges or a skanky shared double room, all the same rent)

some prided themselves on offering better food, like Collingwood, and had got various health eating and catering awards. There was a scheme where you could swap a meal at your college with one at another - if someone else did vice-versa, but not many people did, although getting breakfast at other colleges was quite easy to get away with.

Some of the colleges did have quite nice dining rooms though - Here is Mine (Ok, the furniture is a bit naff!)

And if you have a look at that thread, yes the Fish finger in puff pastry was real!

[hjshorter]

I only lived in a dorm for one semester (at Hood College, 1984) and don't remember the food very well. It was good enough that I gained five pounds that one semester.

Later on I shared a group house near the U of Maryland with four guys. We had a grocery store, liquor store, and 7-11 across the street. Lots and lots of Lipton packages, burritos, and Kraft mac & cheese. Beer, beer, and more beer. Something called Hawaiian punch, which from what I recall had cranberry juice and blueberry schnapps. Ho-hos. Twinkies. Entemanns chocolate chip cookies. And illicit substances.

[alithea]

I always figured it was a combination of to earn money and the whole in loco parentis thing.  Prepaying for your meals guaranteed you wouldn't starve regardless of what other choices you made throughout the semester.

Speaking of not starving-

One of my friends at Harvard never ate in the dining hall. I personally didn't think the food was terrible, but she hated it, and ordered groceries from Homeruns instead.

To get into the Harvard dining hall kitchens you need to swipe your ID card; apparently it not only checks if you are supposed to eat in that specific dining hall (there's a house system instead of standard dorms) but also takes note who never swipes their ID to get food --like my friend. She and her parents received letters of concern that she was anorexic because she hadn't gone into the dining hall more than three times in the past 30 days.

I feel sort of ambivalent about this compilation of data, but maybe it has alerted parents of problems before it's too late.

The only thing truly dubious at HU, incidentally, was the dish called "Steamship of Beef". I don't know anyone who even tried it.

[bergerka]

I feel so out of the loop, I never lived in a dorm. The first year of college, I lived at home (I don't wanna discuss that), so the food was my mom's cooking, very nice. After that I shared an apartment...first with my best friend (to whom I have since apologized for my then-lousy playing-well-with-others skills...the first time she visited us in NYC and saw me do dishes, she wanted to know when I'd been replaced by a pod person), then with an accounting major and an architecture major. Our food consisted of a lot of mac & cheese, pizza, burgers & fries, and yes, occasionally hamburger helper *cringe* although we did occasionally make nice ham & cheese or turkey & cheese sandwiches to take in for lunch or on a picnic (we did 20-mile bike rides on the weekends).

Gad, I ate out a lot in college, come to think of it--good thing I used my bicycle to get around or I'd have ended up at around 250 pounds. And I just wanna BE an opera singer, not LOOK like one.

K

[KateW]

I only lived in a dorm for one semester (at Hood College, 1984) and don't remember the food very well.  It was good enough that I gained five pounds that one semester.

Later on I shared a group house near the U of Maryland with four guys.  We had a grocery store, liquor store, and 7-11 across the street.  Lots and lots of Lipton packages, burritos, and Kraft mac & cheese.  Beer, beer, and more beer.  Something called Hawaiian punch, which from what I recall had cranberry juice and blueberry schnapps.  Ho-hos.  Twinkies.  Entemanns chocolate chip cookies.  And illicit substances.

Cool, you went to Hood? I was there for a year and a half, starting in the fall of 1997. I was in Coblentz (the one with the dining hall, coincidentally). What dorm were you in?

The food was pretty good there. Good variety and I loved it when they had fries at the specialty bar. They also had a pretty good salad bar.

Did you continute attending Hood after you moved out, or was that a total removal from the place?