2008 Woodie Awards
Not so hot?
Campus dining hall experience not as bad as it sounds
Rebecca Bauman
Issue date: 4/17/08 Section: Opinion
Kids like to complain about the food.
During my tenure here at the Collegio, I've seen any number of guest columns and letters featuring complaints about on-campus dining. We couldn't run most of these opinions, if only for their writers' libelous bent on the subject. It seemed as though if anyone had anything to say about Sodexho, it wasn't anything nice.
Of course, I'd never seen this school's dining hall "back in the day," before the remodeling that left it relatively stylish and gleaming. But I had dined at the tables of Sodexho before, in other schools across the country. I'd never minded the food, nor the atmosphere; if anything, dining hall experiences, for me, were often perfectly pleasant; just what I needed.
Living off dining hall fare at other schools offered me substantial opportunities to socialize, forced me out of my shell, allowed me to pick up on what my fellow students were doing and thinking about and, most important, they helped me to maintain a healthy weight.
It wasn't until I moved to Pittsburg and opted out of a meal plan that I really started to balloon up. I'd never cooked much, and so I constantly ate out at local restaurants, most of which aren't known for their top-notch health food items.
I indulged. I over-indulged. I consumed fast food and baked potatoes with extra sour cream and Mexican, Mexican, Mexican.
I gained 50 pounds.
Others might say that it's easy to starve oneself and remain ever-svelte when one is forced to regularly choose from less-than-appetizing options - options like those offered through meal plans.
But, comparatively, I've always seen dining hall food as something ingenious.
Perhaps I lack perspective. I grew up in a household where home-cooked meals were a rarity. I was the daughter of a single mother, a woman who did not cook. I grew up on microwavable meals, Kraft macaroni and cheese, canned salmon and jars of grapefruit slices in light syrup.
Dining hall meals now offer me the kind of "take it or leave it" menu that I imagine is so common at many American family dining tables. A parent might choose what he or she will serve to the clan on any given night, and if Sally Sue or Billy Ben doesn't like it well, then, they'll have to make do.
During my tenure here at the Collegio, I've seen any number of guest columns and letters featuring complaints about on-campus dining. We couldn't run most of these opinions, if only for their writers' libelous bent on the subject. It seemed as though if anyone had anything to say about Sodexho, it wasn't anything nice.
Of course, I'd never seen this school's dining hall "back in the day," before the remodeling that left it relatively stylish and gleaming. But I had dined at the tables of Sodexho before, in other schools across the country. I'd never minded the food, nor the atmosphere; if anything, dining hall experiences, for me, were often perfectly pleasant; just what I needed.
Living off dining hall fare at other schools offered me substantial opportunities to socialize, forced me out of my shell, allowed me to pick up on what my fellow students were doing and thinking about and, most important, they helped me to maintain a healthy weight.
It wasn't until I moved to Pittsburg and opted out of a meal plan that I really started to balloon up. I'd never cooked much, and so I constantly ate out at local restaurants, most of which aren't known for their top-notch health food items.
I indulged. I over-indulged. I consumed fast food and baked potatoes with extra sour cream and Mexican, Mexican, Mexican.
I gained 50 pounds.
Others might say that it's easy to starve oneself and remain ever-svelte when one is forced to regularly choose from less-than-appetizing options - options like those offered through meal plans.
But, comparatively, I've always seen dining hall food as something ingenious.
Perhaps I lack perspective. I grew up in a household where home-cooked meals were a rarity. I was the daughter of a single mother, a woman who did not cook. I grew up on microwavable meals, Kraft macaroni and cheese, canned salmon and jars of grapefruit slices in light syrup.
Dining hall meals now offer me the kind of "take it or leave it" menu that I imagine is so common at many American family dining tables. A parent might choose what he or she will serve to the clan on any given night, and if Sally Sue or Billy Ben doesn't like it well, then, they'll have to make do.
Viewing Comments 1 - 1 of 1
Blankinship
posted 4/20/08 @ 2:30 PM CST
The dinning hall has good days and bad days. Sometimes the service is just bad and it is not just the food. On the weekends the food is the worst. The staff just sits around and does not even try to put out fresh food. (Continued…)
Post a Comment