Sick of the same dining hall food every day? Yeah, same. I think part of the disappointment lies in what I thought college was going to be like. In high school, I thought the college I ended up at would have great food with so many choices! But if you ended up going to a small (and I mean small) school as I did, then you’re probably disappointed.
Now, this is definitely not meant to put down our dining staff, because they’re all great and work super hard every day to feed us. All of our staff is really nice and I appreciate everything they do for us, but usually about two weeks or so into the semester I start to get sick of the food.
We have one dining hall here at Wells, along with our on-campus pub, the Well, and a late night pizza service. This is actually a pretty good amount of options considering the size of our school, but if you’re like me, you probably want to change it up every once in a while.
It’s actually super easy to change up what you’re eating at school, all it takes is a little effort. If you have a car or even access to a ride, you could go into the nearest town to pick up a few groceries. Here’s what I recommend:
- Buy bread along with peanut butter and jelly. I know peanut butter and jelly, original right? Well, it’s a classic and can go a long way in terms of a late night snack or in place of a meal. You can also grab a banana from your dining hall and just like that you have peanut butter and banana sandwiches.
- Canned food is also a really great option if you want to buy groceries on a budget. Tuna, Spaghettios, chicken noodle soup, and ravioli are all great choices that are under $1.
- If buying groceries isn’t an option for you, then you’d be surprised what you can do in the dining hall. At Wells, we have a Live Well station where we can cook meals ourselves! We can cook pasta, rice, and stir fry how we like it.
Even if you don’t have the option of cooking dining hall food for yourself, there are still some pretty good options. Most schools will have a continental option available all day. At Wells, we have bagels, cereal, and a waffle iron available to us during every meal. Personally, I could eat bagels all day, every day. I like to eat bagels with cream cheese in the morning and bagels with butter later in the day. There’s also jelly, peanut butter, and Nutella available for bagels, English muffins, and bread.
You can also put a spin on the food the dining staff prepares! I like to make my own pasta salad by taking the pasta they make us and just adding Italian dressing. We also have apples available that I like to cut up and eat with peanut butter.
Whether you avoid the dining hall at all costs or eat every meal there, there’s always room to personalize what you’re eating. It’s not too hard to switch up what you’ve been eating, as long as you’re creative!