What do you do when you are on campus... and no one else is?

Like most students, I left this past Tuesday for a much needed Thanksgiving break with some delicious food and family bonding. Unlike most other students, however, I made the trek back to campus bright and early on Friday morning to join my teammates for an early afternoon basketball practice. As a senior, this routine is nothing new to me. I am used to the early return to an eerie, but peaceful campus. Accordingly, I am used to the campus without open dining halls. Thanksgiving break is only a warm up for winter break when we arrive on campus a couple of days after Christmas. As much as I miss the ease of the dining hall during these times, I look forward to the small stipend that is passed out for food. As a team we take advantage of the closed dining halls to take some of the stipend money and venture out to local restaurants for dinner. A team favorite is Maguire's in Easton. Maguire's is a wonderful pub restaurant with a wide array of yummy food to feed 16 hungry girls (see link below for their menu!). Other favorites include Albertos, Daddy’s Dairy Ice Cream, Farmer’s Daughter, Café on the Common, and Patty’s Place among others. Additionally, as a student who has been on the meal plan for the last four years, I have rarely shopped for my own food. Snacks, yes. Always. But rarely for “real” food. So I like to look at the no dining hall days as a taste of what it is actually like to buy my own food. 

A normal breakfast during break consists of cereal and milk!

After a tough morning practice, a couple teammates and I will squeeze into the car and head out to the closest grocery store, Roche Brothers in Norton. Once we get there, I look for my staples- cereal, milk, oatmeal, peanut butter, bread, turkey, cheese, fruit, goldfish, soup, frozen veggies, and maybe something sweet. While this list may still not seem like a “real world” shopping list, under the confines of a fridge and microwave, it is as close as I can get-one step closer to life after college. The non-dining hall days seem long on paper, but end quickly. As I write, I see cars rolling in with the rest of the student body- signaling the end of our break and the opening of the dining halls. See you in December, stipend money. 

For more information about Maguire's check out the link below!

http://www.maguiresbarandgrill.com/

The Chase Experiment

          Through my first post and responses to it, on the blog and through friends I shared my post with, it seems I am far from the only one experimenting with overcoming the dinning hall foods. This has inspired me to become more innovative and fueled my interest to expand creative menu. Amongst many failures on my part and of others I have a few new foods to add to the list. Also, I have a few ideas to inspire one to get creative. As a transfer student I've had the opportunity to experience two different types of dining halls. My freshman year I was at Champlain College, in Burlington Vermont, which had one dinning hall for about 2000 students. The same company that provides food for Wheaton is the same that supplies food for Champlain. Both schools had very different dinning halls and experiences. however, I still found myself trying to get past the mass produced bland food that is created. One big thing that I remember is their soft serve ice cream machine. I would mix half of a plastics cup of soft serve ice cream with a half of plastic cup of milk. after mixing it together one has a milkshake! In addition, brownies and other sundae toppings could be added to make a a decent milkshake. When Wheaton introduced their soft serve machine in both Chase and Emerson I was very excited. The unfortunate discontinuation of the ice cream fridge in chase was an unknown compromise for me but I digress. One improvement that I think could be made to this amazing machine is the addition of other flavors. I recall the excitement of having a mint milkshake on days were mint soft serve was offered.
         Stated in a response on my first post, innovation directed toward sandwiches has influenced me to show my creations. As sandwiches are one of my favorite foods, through its ability to be anything. Every sandwich is a blank canvas that can go in any direction. I took the same approach with sandwiches as I did with stir fry scouring both Chase and Emerson for the best ingredients. Through trial and error I have come up with some great ideas. These are just a couple of them:

The first sandwich is a fried egg sandwich with provolone, turkey, and cucumbers on an English muffin. Cucumbers seem to be an odd addition to this breakfast food, but don't hate it til you try it. With the saltiness of the deli meat and cheese it tastes pretty good. Through trial and error I have found that I prefer this sandwich on a bagel as it balances everything out a little better. Lastly the cucumbers and turkey add a little more nutrition to a often unhealthy food. The second sandwich is my favorite and one of my best finds. Now there is nothing really special about this sandwich other than the bread. During diner they serve fresh bread which is perfect for sandwiches. Cutting two tick slices and a dash of butter on the outside sides causes a nice toasting of the bread when placed in the panini press. The addition of a good slice of bread can change a sandwich and definitely makes Wheatons dinning hall sandwiches better. What are your sandwich ideas? What can you make using nothing from the deli line?

Thanksgiving and all of its anxieties

Thanksgiving is a holiday that has since my childhood held a lot of complexities and anxieties. The holiday itself is one of a tragic tradition that has over centuries become sugar coated and commercialized; sold with 5 lb turkeys and hallmark cards of smiling families and strong patriarchs standing at the head of the table. Thanksgiving over time, has acquired new and diverse meanings for individuals and their families however, and for me, it is a day (both positive and negative) in which family comes together to break bread and celebrate gratitude together (which I love). Every year that my nuclear family hosted the meal since I can remember, the food has been an adventure; from raw vegan thanksgiving (I'm still traumatized) to the "traditional" turkey themed meal, having Thanksgiving at my house was always cause for much discussion and debate. Such diversity and potential for variation in the meal led to my family being banned from hosting the holiday at our house (which I think my mom may have plotted from day one- brilliant woman). This reminded me of the discussion we had in class surrounding Dancing Skeletons: Life and Death in West Africa by Katherine A. Dettwyler, in which the anthropologist requests food solely from one of her hosts' wives and does her best to avoid houses with food she didn't prefer. It is funny though, because regardless of what wild inventions my mom decided to present on the day of gratitude, the two food items that remained constant throughout, were stuffing and pie, my two favourite dishes, and the things I look forward to most every year. I realize that my mom made the stuffing specifically for my sister and I in order to appease us and it has become such a staple, that the thought of Thanksgiving without these items doesn't feel right.
This year for the first time, I went to visit my paternal family in Pennsylvania and was both excited and terrified for the adventure that was to come. I am ethnically mixed as my maternal family is hispanic and north african, and as I was raised by my mom and maternal side, I identify culturally with the stereotypical loud and feisty female powerhouses, and food-based affection, so when I went to my paternal sides home for such  a food-central holiday, I was anxious to see how the meal and conversation would unfold and was very nervous to see how the family dynamics would allow me to fit in.
Not only did I have nothing to be anxious about, but the dinner, conversation, and family dynamic was really nice, eerily civil, and extremely welcoming. A lot of tragedy has occurred on this side of the family in the past few years and I suppose that for this reason, what remains of the family has come together and become much warmer and closer than ever before. Along with this, the food was unbelievable and incorporated dishes such as cauliflower gratin, string beans, peas, mashed potatoes, candied yams, turkey, turnip and apple puree, and thankfully, my staples of stuffing and pie! The stuffing (although not my mammas' ) was beyond delicious and made me feel connected to this side of the family, regardless of my initial anxieties. The pies were also superb and included a variety of chocolate pecan, pumpkin, sweet potato, apple pie, and a milk tart. I felt like I was at home, and realized firsthand, how like we read in the beginning of the year, food can take you back to your home (or country) wherever you are. While I was not with my usual crew (maternal family,) I felt like we were together as I stuffed myself with stuffing and savored sweet pies, and I had a really wonderful time.

Dark Chocolate Pecan Pie

Pumpkin Pie with a "Turkey" pastry on top

Apple Pie

Sweet Potato Pie

Stuffing!!! (My favourite)

String Beans

Thanksgiving Buffet: a plethora of food. This picture is interesting because as I looked at the copious amount of food in front of me, I couldn't help but think of the clients from the "Cupboard of Kindness" and about all of the people who don't have the privilege of feasting as I did with friends and family. It made me feel strange but also deepened my sense of appreciation and gratitude for the opportunities and privilege I live by not having to worry about having enough food. 

marshmallow candied yams... first time I had marshmallows on top- very yummy

cauliflower gratin - yummier than it appears in photo

BEAT THE CLOCK PIZZA

Beat the clock pizza is an offer that happens Mondays and Wednesdays from 5-9 pm at Barrowsville Station Market, Deli and Liqours. This place is located in Norton about 5 minutes from campus, and in my opinion, this pizza is the real deal. The pizzas are massive (18") and very tastey. So here is how it works. From anytime you call in for a large pizza between 5 o clock and 9 o clock, that is the price you pay for your pizza. So for example, like I did today, I called at exactly 5:00 pm and split it with my roommate. So the price of the pizza was 5 dollars and me and my roommate got 4 very large slices of pizza for $2.50! I love cool deals like this one especially when I like the quality of the food.

Pizza isn't the only thing Barrowsville Station excels in. This is also a deli where you can get a variety of sandwiches and it is also a liquor store all in one. At the register, there is the option for lottery tickets tobacco, and what ever else you may need. Along with that, Barrowsville station is a little market that carriers important things you may need for your house. I usually just go for the pizza but this place is

the real deal! Check it out sometime.

Pumping Iron

To be blunt, I know there is a lack of iron in my diet, and that leads me to believe that I am deprived of the nutritional value that comes from iron-rich meals. With no intention to sound like a hypochondriac, after reading Nevin S. Scrimshaw’s article on iron deficiency it dawned on me that a good majority of female and male college students –myself included –have some moderate form of anemia. Iron has the function of transporting oxygen in blood by pairing with hemoglobin to “pick up oxygen in the lungs and shuttle and release it throughout the body”. About 73% of your body’s iron supply is found in hemoglobin during the creation of red blood cells (Scrimshaw). Common symptoms of iron depletion are weakness, headaches, extreme fatigue, chest pains, shortness of breath and paleness. I am not trying to compare the deficiency of iron in students’ diets to that of Scrimshaw’s field of study in developing nations such as Kenya and Indonesia, but his studies did pose the question in my mind –how can I improve my consumption of iron in the foods offered by Wheaton dining?

A woman between the ages of 19 and 50 need 18mg of iron daily, and a man needs 8mg of iron, but vegetarians may need even more milligrams because plant products have a lower iron turnover percentage when it reaches your blood. So, let’s start with the most important meal of the day: breakfast. For me, this seemed to be the easiest meal to find good sources of iron. Breakfast cereals are surprisingly iron-rich because of the whole grains in them. A bowl of Cheerios has 45% of your daily serving of iron in ¾ of a cup. Other cereals high in iron are Frosted Mini Wheat’s, Life cereal and Oat Bran Flakes. Lunch proved to be trickier to find iron for my diet, as I am a pretty picky eater when it comes to meat (a food extremely high in iron). I decided to pair a bowl of clam chowder and a salad to compensate for a plant source and seafood source of iron. A serving of clams (3 oz) is 14 mg of iron. Dinner was very similar to lunch, and I ended up stumbling upon broccoli soup, a type of roasted chicken and brown rice as potential iron rich items. I must say that from reading the nutritional facts of each of these foods, they by themselves are not very iron rich but together they are sufficient enough to supply a meal with enough iron. Broccoli is one of the most iron-rich green vegetables, and poultry along with any other meat will be a reliable supply of iron.

Throughout this day, I realized finding foods to eat with enough iron in them forced me out of my comfort zone of my normal five or six meal choices here at Wheaton. What I need to realize is the importance of iron for my health, and making small adjustments in what I choose for breakfast, lunch or dinner could make all the difference!

Want more information about creating an iron-rich diet? The University Health Center’s website provides tips on which foods to eat and proposed menus to achieve the highest amount of iron in your daily diet. Just click here! https://www.uhs.uga.edu/nutrition/iron.html

Peace and World Conscience House: International Potluck

Apparently, as a Peace House tradition, we have an International Potluck every year to bring together or ethnicities and cultural heritages through the usage of homemade food. When first hearing about this gathering, I was really stumped as to what I should make because another housemate upstairs said he was going to make Irish soda bread so I wasn't allow to duplicate the same country. I thought long and hard about other places where my heritages have stemmed from and I thought of England. An old time favorite of mine was my mother's homemade Shepard's Pie, or otherwise known as Cottage Pie. This dish is thought to have stemmed from Northern England in the 1700s by poor families who needed to use the left over scraps of meat from the previous day's meal. Shepard's pie consists of beef, or lamb, covered in corn and mashed potato which would have been accessible to make a hearty meal. Surprisingly, some of my housemates have never tried, or heard of, Shepard's pie before. It had been a staple food in my household growing up so it was odd to think that other's had never tried a dish like this. Out of respect and hunger, we all agreed to try each other's dishes for a taste of what we all call home (and to judge each other's cooking abilities of course!)

African Donuts and Taco Soup 

At this Pot Luck, we had an array of cultures represent such as the Dominican Republic, Mali, Ivory Coast, Italy, Ireland, and Poland. Everyone was responsible for making their dishes homemade so no frozen dishes were accepted. This gathering brought our house closer together over the shared commonality of food. Not only was the house invited to this gathering, we asked our close friends to come and enjoy the food we prepared as well. We all love to eat and eating food from our culture as well as each others' was a really rewarding experience.

Chicken and Cheese Empanadas 

Even though Peace House consists of eight individuals from eight different places around the world, we were about to connect and share our experiences through the power of food.

Our One-of-a-Kind Pot Luck Experience 

The Duck & Bunny - Providence, RI

Where can Wheaton students go to get delicious and unique food served in a place that reminds them of home? Last weekend I visited the Duck & Bunny in Providence after hearing about it from several different people and it was a dining experience like no other! The restaurant classifies itself as a “snuggery,” which they define as “a space that was as much a work of art as the food itself.” Duck & Bunny is located inside a historic home with preserved wood floors, fireplaces, and framed art which add a lot to the comfortable and home-like atmosphere.

 

The food itself is definitely a work of art. They offer a selection of crepes as well as cheese plates, sandwiches, and cupcakes. All are innovative and original. From my understanding, they are especially known for their tea and coffee. The menu and the location definitely work together to create a certain social experience. Tea and scones by a fire is much more personal and intimate than a large, noisy dining hall, for example. For me, the atmosphere reminded me of home. I strongly recommend Duck & Bunny to anyone who misses home-cooked meals in a cozy environment – the perfect social experience.