It’s my first year at university and I’m already getting sick of the food at the dining halls. All of the nutritional facts of the main courses have fat higher than protein (mostly being sat.), everything is over salted, and it tastes bad.
I need help deciding what to eat. I can make shakes in my room but I don’t want to be drinking those all day. My meal plan is a freedom plan (unlimited food at dining halls). Breakfast they have eggs, sausage/bacon, some form of potatoe, and pancakes. Lunch and Dinner meals are pretty much the same: pizza, burgers, stirfry, vegan meals etc. All day they have: cereal, bagels, fruit, and veggies/salad(not at breakfast).
I can go to the caf. 3-4 times per day, and make as many shakes as I want. How should I organize my meals? What should I eat? Some days they have plain chicken breasts (with mashed potatoes but I just throw that away) and I’ll eat that, but it doesn’t come often.
My shakes are looking like this right now:
Milk
Eggs
PP
Oats
Banana
Sorry for such an unorganized post, I couldn’t help it.
they wouldnt even let me take like 1 cup of brocolli and 1 cup of cauliflower back to my room for veggies.
you shouldve seen the look when i actually wanted whole wheat bread.
I would reccomend buying a george foreman type grill or getting a micro fridge for your room. This is what my school offers (the microfridge) and i use it for my frozen bag of perdue chicken breasts, egg beaters, and even ground turkey/beef.
Also are you in the middle of nowhere or is there a grociery store near by?
i recommend you get a slow cooker and do up some roasts. you will get lots of protein for cheap. boiling a couple dozen eggs at once will also give you a ready supply of protein. unsalted nuts, fish oil, and you can go to a fruit and vegetable or farmers market for cheap produce.
it sounds like you are able to get your hands on fruits and veggies and sometimes decent protein. if you are staying away from the carbs, eating fattier meat is ok as long as you take in some healthy fat to balance it and it is not deepfried.
also if you have access to an oven, you can easily make roasted chicken, either legs or chicken breasts.
Well I do own a slow cooker, but I’d rather keep things simple and cheap. Also a walk to the grocery store is pretty long and I don’t have that much extra time other than weekends.
I forgot to mention I also have lots of raw nuts in my room (walnuts, almonds, cashews, and macadamian), plain and chocolate protein powder, fish oils, and G+C.
How many times a day should I be going to the caf? I still have time to switch my meal plan. Other ones give me way less meals, but money I can use at a few stores and restaurants.
If they aren’t going to be serving good enough protein sources 3-4 times a day then there’s no sense paying for enough to do it.
I’d cut the meal plan down, bring ziplock bags in my bookbag and snag all the chicken beef eggs plenty of vegetables or whatever you want to bring back to your room. Use the extra money and buy some chicken and beef at the grocery store once a week or as often as is convenient to you.
18 meals a week
50 exchanges for $8.45 at certain restaurants (I think a few are healthy) per term
100$ to be used at certain locations, I’ll have to see if any of those are grocery stores
or same can be done but 15 meals and 200$
The 18/week would only give me 2-3 meals per day.
Maybe I’ll do this:
1 cheat meal at dining hall each day (pack lots of protein)
2-3 meals at dining hall mostly veggies and fruit, can add in some sandwiches (turkey or roastbeef)
2 shakes a day (2 eggs, 2 cups of milk, and a scoop of protein in each)
Does your college force you to buy a meal plan? If not I would suggest getting a hot plate/camping stove and a mini propane BBQ and start cooking healthy. Hopefully they give you a mini fridge and freezer.
My university forces residents to buy a meal plan and they serve NOTHING health. Fortunately, I live in the city off-campus.
[quote]vision1 wrote:
FightingScott wrote:
What are your options for getting protein from whole foods in the dining hall besides overfattened meats?
eggs, not much more. I forgot to say they also have cold cuts so I can make sandwiches if I want. Even more salt though…[/quote]
I’ve been eating a lot of turkey from the deli section at my cafeteria, but my cafeteria offers healthy meats sometimes and healthy food of some sort, somewhere nearly all the time. Are there any cafe-like places or other food vendors on campus that allow you to get a set price of food in exchange for one of your meals?
[quote]FightingScott wrote:
vision1 wrote:
FightingScott wrote:
What are your options for getting protein from whole foods in the dining hall besides overfattened meats?
eggs, not much more. I forgot to say they also have cold cuts so I can make sandwiches if I want. Even more salt though…
I’ve been eating a lot of turkey from the deli section at my cafeteria, but my cafeteria offers healthy meats sometimes and healthy food of some sort, somewhere nearly all the time. Are there any cafe-like places or other food vendors on campus that allow you to get a set price of food in exchange for one of your meals?[/quote]
Yes $8.45, but that`s only if I switch to an 18meal per week plan
[quote]JoeyD20 wrote:
Does your college force you to buy a meal plan? If not I would suggest getting a hot plate/camping stove and a mini propane BBQ and start cooking healthy. Hopefully they give you a mini fridge and freezer.
My university forces residents to buy a meal plan and they serve NOTHING health. Fortunately, I live in the city off-campus.[/quote]
do it Anabolic Diet style. sounds like the best plan for your situation as far as convenience goes. bacon/sausage/eggs for breakfast, Burgers (no bun) for lunch, and either burgers or chicken (I personally would go burgers for the extra cals) for dinner. Just have some shakes with olive oil and flax in between meals.
cut chicken breasts in half (so they are 1/2 as thick) and freeze them in ziplock bags with ready made marinade. Grill these when needed.
Also, steal food from the dining hall. In my experience, they make so much food that a lot goes to waste so i dont feel bad taking some for myself. (maybe im just rationalizing theft)
take some fruit, maybe some hard boiled eggs. These will come in handy when away from the dining hall.
YOU know what gents? Fuck the dinning hall people! go to the dean and complain about them not letting you take out food, your fucking paying for it! they should not be able to ration any of the food that you guys are paying a shit load of money for! i mean it is part of your meal plan to either eat at the hall 1-20 times a day!
I agree with the above. In our dining halls the official rule was you were allowed 1 piece of fruit and a styrofoam coffee cup when you left. Unofficially, people used to pack whatever they could get away with in their bags. I had a friend who used to make monster turkey sammiches for in between classes.
About the only good thing they served in ours was chicken nuggets. We lived for chicken nugget day.
first off, tupperware, or other plastic containers for toting food are needed.
not enough time? alright, normally i’d go off on you, but i remember school (and something about a been everywhere, seen everywhere award while there).
by the time i graduated, i had my shit together enough that i would walk about 5 miles to a store that sold buffalo and ostrich burgers and load up, walk back. instant GPP work. if you are lazy, bus, bike, cute chick with daddy’s car?
for $20 you should be able to score yourself at least 10 hefty servings of meat, if not nearly twice that should you be lucky enough to be in a bigger city or near a meat packers. i don’t see how you can get cheaper than a roast if you happen to be preparing meat. put it on for a few hours while you are doing homework/assignments and bingo you are multitasking with the finest (and have meat for the week).
the anabolic diet idea is good too, just cut the carbs with all meals except after a workout. make sure that you consume enough fat, veggies and some fruit with each such meal. the fruit is optional, fat and veggies are not.