The Incubator

MEGHAN SWEENEY / THE EAGLE BLOGS NETWORK

Warm weather, students on the quad, and flower buds dotting AU landscape can only mean one thing – spring is here.  Spring is the beginning of shirts that show your arms and skirts that barely cover your behind.  The extra skin is enough to make any girl concerned about her appearance, which is why after spring break I vowed to eat healthier and exercise more so I won’t be embarrassed to be seen in a tank top and shorts.

Eating healthy at AU is not an easy feat.  There is the buffet of junk food and calorie-rich meals in TDR, and the grease-soaked entrees in the Tavern, not to mention the vending machines in every building that I go into on campus, including the dorms.?

The temptations follow me every waking hour of my day; I can’t resist.  If I don’t have my sugar fix, I get terrible headaches, my stress levels go through the rough and I’m irritable.  I feel like I’m a crack addict that will do anything for a fix, except I’m not on crack and I just really want chocolate. I decided not to eradicate junk food, for my own sanity, from my diet completely. Instead I eat a cookie or a brownie per day and try to keep the snacking to a minimum at night.

What do you eat when healthy options are at a minimum? Salads at box lunch and the tavern are usually edible but nowhere near the quality of Field of Greens (especially if you buy your own dressing from Trader Joes).

If lunch is like trying to find a needle in a haystack then trying to find a healthy dinner in TDR is virtually impossible.  Would it kill the Bon Appétit staff to put a calorie count on the menu?

Every night I forage the cafeteria for the healthiest looking meal.  I ignore the salad bar because I’m never sure when the staff puts fresh salad out, and there is nothing worse than eating a wilted piece of lettuce.  Not to mention the dressings are less than adequate in taste and color.

I start with the vegetarian section and find a tofu product, a vegetable concoction that I am not brave enough to try and some kind of potato.  In hopes of finding a more appetizing meal I go to the carnivorous section of TDR.  There I find meat, potatoes, rice or a vegetable.  My conclusion: AU must have a lifetime supply of potatoes because they are present at every meal.

Typically, I have the farmers’ market soup because somehow putting “farmers’ market” in front of the word “soup” makes it sound healthier.  My soup is accompanied by nine-grain toast with strawberry preserve and lemonade or grape juice.

There are times when even the soups are not appetizing. This is a dilemma that forces me to eat pomegranate glazed pork (should pork be pomegranate glazed? Not in my world, but TDR obviously thinks otherwise) with a side of white sweet fingerling potatoes.

To compensate for the excessive amounts of calories I consume in TDR I drink only water during the day because, as my roommate says, I’d rather not drink my calories.  Water is completely void of all calories making it a healthy alternative to soda and most juices. It’s a drink that won’t add anymore junk to my trunk.

This entry was posted Sunday, March 21st, 2010 at 7:30 pm and is filed under The AU Gourmet. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.