Kalamazoo College 04-08. The food was TERRIBLE about 90% of the time. The only days it was really good was when they knew that the college was expecting a hundred prospective students with family. We had the usual mystery meats, over boiled or undercooked veggies, and the salad bar from hell. I regularly found dirt in the salad. The salad and a lot of the toppings were often still frozen. We kept having the toaster taken away because of idiots that would try to put doughnuts in them. The only thing dependable was the pizza line, cereal area, and hamburger line so it wasn’t great if you were looking to eat healthy. There’s only one cafeteria on the campus so it was either that food or go hungry.
To add insult to injury, anybody living on campus MUST be on the food plan. And it was REQUIRED for you to live your first two years on campus. After some quick math, I realized that I was being forced to pay $9 per crappy meal.
University of Florida early 80s. Food was mediocre but not inedible. Off campus food could be quite good in a fast food, “I’ve got the munchies” kind of way. Went to USF in the mid-to-late 80s as well. Didn’t live on Campus, and don’t recall much about the food. I think they had a fast food cafeteria at the Student Union building and not much else worth remembering. Living in an apartment vs a dorm gave a lot more options for cooking.
I also went to UCSD, but many decades later than Spectre of Pithecanthropus. 
The regular meal stuff was pretty blah. (This was the Muir College dining hall.) They tried to make it cool by having food stations such as the pizza station, the pasta station, the Mongolian BBQ station, etc. The pizza was always doughy and greasy, the pasta flavorless and wet (they kept the cooked pasta in water), and the Mongolian vegetables always undercooked because they were trying to serve so many people. There was a pretty good chicken club sandwich that I ate frequently, but mainly I ate frozen dinners. Later, dinners morphed into peanut butter M&M’s and coke. I still cringe when I look back on those days and I wonder how I could function on that.
Breakfast at the same place was actually pretty good, if I could get out of bed by 11 a.m. on the weekends. Waffle iron station, pretty good oatmeal, and awesome omelettes. This is where I discovered the wonderfulness that is the veggie omelette filled with refried beans. Yum!
My school (pretty easily discernible by my username) switched dining services midway through undergrad. My experience as a freshman and sophomore was so bad it isn’t worth mentioning. Post-sophomore year, this is what we had:
All-you-can-eat from 5 or 6 different stations, although off-peak hours offered significantly fewer options. Regardless of pickiness, there were always options at dinner. One station offered “home cooked” comfort food, one was Italian, one was Mediterranean(ish),one was Asian, one was grilled sandwiches, and one was cold sandwiches. Then there was pizza, DIY salads, and grill stuff (burgers/hotdogs/chicken tenders) for those who weren’t interested in the other selections.
Although there was a price increase for the new system, it was worth it. Even when I moved off-campus I kept a dining hall meal plan. Of course, Wake did it differently than every other college I’ve visited, so YMMV. Overall, I was satisfied most days, if not pleased.
Plus they had two different hot sauces available, which can make fried poop taste like it was prepared by Emeril.
You thought Wash U had great food? Where on campus did you eat?!? I recall the deli in the anthro building being fairly good and the Wohl cafeteria being okay on a Saturday or Sunday for brunch (mmmm… pancakes!), but other than that, it was the same dry bagels and fast food. I think I lived mostly on coffee, which is probably why I was about 50 pounds lighter than I am now.
Then again, I haven’t attended in 7 years - they could have improved significantly since then.
I ate at Center Court in Wohl, and I got some really tasty made-to-order stir fry. Wash U has been in the top 10 for campus food in the country for at least 2-3 years, or since I applied.
To elaborate on my OP: I go to Cornell, and the dining options can be mind-boggling at times. On North Campus, where the freshmen live, there are two all-you-can-eat dining halls, each with some pretty good variety. In addition to the standard rotating hot dishes, one of them has a made-to-order stir fry station and a grill. There are also weekly specials, such as chicken wings or a taco bar. Sunday brunch is fantastic! There’s custom made omelets, pancakes, and an awesome dim sum bar. There are special dinners every month or so with a special theme, and sometimes they bring in some big-name chefs to design the menu.
The West Campus dining halls (where upperclassmen live) are smaller and have a smaller selection, but the quality is still good. Every week there’s a “House Dinner” where they break out the linen napkins and it’s a bit more formal. Twice they have served NY strip steak.
On Central, where all classes are held, there are various eateries that serve made-to-order subs, burritos, quesadillas, sandwiches, etc. that are very nice. Off campus, Ithaca, NY allegedly has more restaurants per capita than NYC, so there’s never a shortage of new places to try.
Actually, I am a terrible person to ask. My mother was a very bad cook (I literally did not know that mashed potatos could come from something besides a package, meat was not supposed to be black, and that speghetti need not come from a can) so I thought the food was great. I ate everything in sight. I gained weight. This being said, there were major food protests at the college (one where people piled a bunch of the food together with paper napkins, put lighter fluid on it and lit it). And about the end of my sophomore year, the guy in charge of the food service was arrested for taking bribes and buying substandard food for the college.
But as I said, I thought it was great.
During my freshman year at MIT ('69-'70) the food was great. That was because Marriott’s contract was up for renewal. Sophomore year the food sucked. Junior and senior years I cooked for myself, using a battery of hot plates and toaster ovens.
I spent my first year of grad school in a U of I dorm, where the food was so bad I wrote a talking blues about it.
Been all day to classes
And lunchtime rolls around
Oh the meat it is green
And the vegetables are brown
Judging from my kids, food is a lot better now, since there is more emphasis on healthy food and a lot more competition.
Ohio University, 1968-1972.
I thought the dining hall food was absolutely great! Unlimited seconds on everything except special nights like steak, lots of variety, and as much to eat as you needed. I didn’t have much extra money for evening snacks so it was a blessing to be able to fill up at dinner.