Hi Oriana and Jenny!
i'm a rising junior in college and have managed to survive being a vegan
here, even though i'm the only one in the entire school.
are you guys required to buy a meal plan? i was. during my freshman year,
i had to purchase the 21-meal-a-week plan. at first, i just tried to find
what i could that was vegan (i.e. fruit for breakfast, salad for lunch and
dinner, and once in a while what i _thought_ was vegan vegetables). but
then my sophomore year i decided to take action. it took a while, but after
consulting with the manager of the cafeteria and explaining to him my
dietary restrictions, the cafeteria (catered by marriott) began offering
vegan meals. what really helped was giving them recipes and putting them in
contact with managers of other marriott-catered schools that offer vegan
meals. but most likely your schools should be equipped to handle veg*ns.
but be careful! what seems to be a healthy vegetarian casserole can be
loaded with fat! (they tend to use _a lot_ of cheese here).
but even then i enjoy cooking for myself. and i guess you might be planning
on cooking or going out, but i don't know if you'll really have time for
that all throughout the day. i know i didn't. dinner, maybe, but i know
lunch was always such a rush. and breakfast--sheesh, i was rolling out of
bed 5 minutes before class.
but anyway, my dorm had a kitchen in the basement that the students could
use, so i used that sometimes (are you living on campus? your dorm might
have one). of course, it was a pain to walk up and down the stairs, so i had
a fridge, a microwave, a wok, and a blender in my room. the microwave was
pretty versatile, could do about anything with that. and the wok is great
for steaming vegetables (stir fry minus the oil) and even cooking pasta.
and i love the blender for fresh-fruit smoothies.
i'm not familiar with your area, but i'm sure you will be able to find some
sort of health food store, maybe you can even stock your fridge (does it
have a freezer part?) with some frozen stuff to cook quickly, have lots of
(healthy) snack food handy for all that late night studying :o)
on the freshman 15. the students here who gained weight (believe me, it
happens) did so mostly for the following reasons: 1) our cafeteria is set
up buffet-style, with tons of junk food available, and all kinds of
desserts. it's all you can eat; most of them go crazy with the ice cream
machine. 2) dinner is served really early (from 5-6), so they would get
hungry around 11 or so and end up ordering pizza or trotting to the snack
machine or something. 3) not exercising, in addition to this overeating
so mainly, my advice to you is to have healthy food available upon demand
well, good luck, you guys! if you have any more questions, i'd be happy to
try to answer.
holly
hbottomley@xxxxxxxxxxxx
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