Inspired by this thread, what is the best dorm or cafeteria meal you’ve ever had?
Dorms are well known for serving below quality meals to many many people, but every once in a while, they shine.
My brother had done some research at a oceanographic extension of University of Michigan in the northern part of the lower penninsula. The next summer me, him and a bunch of his friends went up there to do some hang gliding on the nearby dunes. We had a meal in their dorm (cost us $3.00 each).
They had had a new building open that day and they brought over the extra shrimp. It was plump, flavorful and more than even a starving college student could chow down.
The Graydon Center cafeteria at American University has a first-class menu. We keep trying to get our daughter to eat there, but she never wants to – even good food gets tiring after awhile.
Our school has a special meal each month called formal meal. We’d dress up in black robes and have guest speakers. The meal would be something like a chicken dinner, or pan-fried fish. We had some sort of curry meal once. Nicer food than usual (and the usual wasn’t bad).
Andrea’s Mother’s Homemade Red Velvet Cake with Homemade Cream Cheese Frosting. (Spring, 1997)
My college buddy’s girlfriend’s mother shipped her a homemade red velvet cake in a care package that remains – nearly ten years later – the best I’ve ever tasted. Normally when I eat a red velvet cake, I can’t get past the taste of the red dye. Not so with this cake. Moist. Delicious. Incomparable.
The last time I ate a dorm meal was many, many moons ago, but I fondly remember Sunday Brunch at Humboldt State University back in the 70s. Full breakfast buffett, fresh fruit, full waffle station, crates of fresh eggs cooked to order, 7 juices, pastries, etc. etc., and all for breakfast points against your food plan. We would grab a couple of Sunday papers, spread out, and pack on the calories. Most of us wouldn’t eat again until dinner Monday!
Since my dorm didn’t serve Sunday dinner, that would have been a good thing. Would have saved that Sunday nigth “where ya wanna go for dinner, I dunnon, where you wanna go?”
My undergraduate university has a School of Hotel Management. So the cafeterieas naturally start out a little more oriented towards quality than perhaps usual. Then, two or three times a year, they bring in a whole staff from a fancy restraurant, who go around to each cafeteria in turn and cook it up for the students. You can cough up a little extra $ and get the sit-down wait-service meal, if you want. But even the regular meal plan schlubs get food that’s about as fancy as you can get coming off of a steam-tray line.
I, wasn’t as excited about food then as I am now, but I do remember the rattlesnake chili and the frog’s legs.
We had a Neptune night once a year, where they had lobster and other seafood. (It was actually depressing, because people got lobsters and had no idea what to do with them so they threw them out after making a cursory effort.)
