Eating in the Dining Halls

Kyle and Owen hanging out in Rathbone with one of their favorite LU Basketball players (K & O still in their own bball uniforms after a game)

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The thing that seems to astound people the most about our life on campus is the fact that we eat, as a family, regularly, in the dining halls. People are very curious about this experience and are also often shocked (and dismayed! lol!) that we do this. Eating in the dining halls is definitely the topic I get asked most about.

The thing is, at most boarding schools, and at some residential colleges/universities, it is a regular occurrence to see faculty families eating in the dining halls. But at Lehigh, a place that historically has not had faculty living on campus, and a place that has not — until now — had faculty families eating in the dining halls (at least not in recent decades), it is truly unheard of for a professor — let alone with his or her family — to be eating amongst students in the dining halls. You just don’t see it; breakfast, lunch, dinner, it just doesn’t happen.

When we moved to campus we had every intention of taking full advantage of the dining halls as a way to ease up our often-very-frenzied-and-harried evening routine. We also knew that if we were going to do this (live on campus), then we were going to jump in with both feet to the deep end of the pool. Eating in the dining halls is part of that for us. I think that eating in the dining halls — with students, where students eat — takes the residential campus experience to a whole other (deeper, broader) level. It is symbolic: it means, ‘we are the real deal, we are in this fully, we are even eating with you!’ There is something very humanizing and humbling about eating together.

Meera, so proud of her developing chopsticks skills, eating dinner at Rathbone

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And so, despite the unprecedented nature of the Faculty-Family-Eating-In-Dining-Hall act, despite the sheer social awkwardness of it, despite the stares and quizzical looks and whispers from the students and the dining hall staff– “who the heck is that?! and why on earth are they here?!”… despite all that we plowed forward as a family of five and proceeded, right from the start, to eat in the dining halls 1-2 times per week. We’ve done that for the past six months.

The first few times we ate in the dining halls were CRAZY. For one thing, we were trying to get a lay of the land. But the biggest challenge was to rise above the awkwardness about the fact that everyone — from the students to the cooks to the dishwashing staff — noticed us, looked at us, stared at us, or (best case scenario) just came right out and asked us what in the world we were doing there. I’ll be honest, as a faculty member it was very challenging for me to hold my head up high and just plow forward.

We’d bring a booster seat for Meera, get situated at a table, get our food, and eat. But it was impossible to not feel totally 100% out of place, and in a fishbowl, and under the microscope. It took some serious OOMPH to go back again and again the first several times. I probably would have chickened out, but Braydon was adamant that we plow forward, and the kids were always chomping at the bit to go to the dining hall (they love it).

Gradually, though, over time, we’ve become less of a curiosity, and it seems that most students and staff have come to not bat an eye at seeing us around. So, now it is becoming more normalized for us to eat in the dining halls each week. I think most students and dining hall staff have seen us by this point, they’ve heard through the grapevine who we are, and the stares have turned into cheerful smiles and nods of acknowledgment. It is now totally comfortable for me to eat in the dining halls with my family. We are still, however, virtually the only non-students doing it. In the past six months I have only seen one staff person (a Resident Assistant {hello Brandon!!!} who lives on campus) eating in a dining hall, and I have never once seen a faculty member.

Owen’s dining hall dinner choices mimic precisely what he observes the football and basketball players eating: pasta and cereal / Kyle is more adventurous and will try lots of things most nights (I don’t have any idea what he is eating in this picture)

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Before living on campus, I never ate in a dining hall at Lehigh (had never even seen one). Why don’t faculty and staff eat in the dining halls? There are surely a whole host of reasons. But one of them, definitely, is that people presume that the food must be horrible.

I’ve been really surprised by how non-horrible the food is. In my opinion, the food is mediocre (which is not horrible). But for institutional food (remember, I am familiar with institutional food; I grew up at a camp!), I think it is really good. There is a huge variety, always a fresh salad bar, lots of vegetarian and vegan options, and relatively healthy offerings. These are the things that make me comfortable having my family eat there. But the issue with institutional food is that it is institutional food — it is generally not the highest quality ingredients — and there is just no getting around the mediocrity of it.

The thing about our family, though, is that we are not above eating mediocre stuff (and I have a philosophical problem with anyone who thinks they are). Yes, we like our fancy food, and yes, most would quickly label us (especially me) Foodies, but we can chow down on the basics just like anyone else. And we can also be creative– a couple nights ago I got some rice from the Asian station, a grilled chicken breast (minus the bun; it was supposed to be a chicken sandwich) from the grill station, and some stir fried veggies, and made a nice plate for Kyle. Being creative at the dining hall is something my kids will excel at early I suspect! (This is an important and relatively invisible skill of some people who have lots of experience with institutional food! You can always spot a kid who has been to boarding school because they are so creative mixing-and-matching to come up with a dinner in the dining hall!). The other thing is this: through the dining halls my kids have been exposed to all sorts of Non-Foodie-Foods that they otherwise would not have been– jello, “Chinese noodles” (those thin hard crunchy noodles that are sometimes on salad bars), a variety of canned fruit that they never knew existed, and all sorts of other things. Granted, they have discovered they don’t like most of these things. But still, I’m glad they’ve tried it. Honestly.

And for the most part, the dining hall food is good. We can always find something decent to eat. This isn’t the school cafeteria of the past. This is a modern version of eating on campus. Schools like Lehigh go all out with their student food services.

above: a typical dining hall dinner for Meera (salad with ranch dressing; roast beef; penne pasta with alfredo sauce; milk)

below: a typical dining hall dinner for me (Heather)

Meera ALWAYS gets ice cream after dinner in the dining hall

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From the start we established a dining hall routine. Here’s our deal:

1. First we find a table. We sit alone, as a family of five. We don’t (except for a couple of rare exceptions to this rule) invite students to eat with us at our table.
2. We all go to the salad bar first. Everyone gets a salad, and we sit down to eat it together before proceeding to our main entrees.
3. The only allowable drinks are milk or water. Period. No exceptions. Ever.
4. You can choose anything for your main entree (everyone always chooses different things and we inevitably always try everybody’s choices). If you eat pasta and cereal for dinner, that is fine (O). If you eat a hot dog and fries for dinner, that is fine (M). If you eat a waffle for dinner, that is fine (K). This is all fine because we already had a big salad!… and we’re only eating in the dining halls once or twice a week. (And, if truth be told, the bambinos are making better and healthier dining hall choices all the time as the novelty of the pasta-bar-&-bottomless-fries-&-Belgian-waffle-maker begin to wear off.)
5. If you eat a good dinner you can have dessert. (Meera is the only one who consistently opts to have dessert anyway.)
6. After you’re done eating a good solid dinner, you can go socialize. (The bambinos know how to work a room… I am telling you!… They know more people on campus — by far — than Braydon and I combined… And there are always lots of people they want to chat it up with after dinner in the dining hall. This is their main incentive for wanting to eat at the dining hall.) p.s. You should see the way they can light up a student’s face, just by hanging out with them while they eat.

This routine has been working for us.

Owen, the Master of the Post-Dinner-Socializing, in (above) Cort Dining Hall, and (below) Rathbone

above: hanging out in Rathbone (left), and hanging out in Cort (right)

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Last week we had a first. Thursday night I had to teach a graduate seminar 4-7pm, and Kyle and Owen had to be picked up from a basketball game at 6:00. We didn’t want Braydon to have to drag Meera out on a school night to pick up her brothers, so we got a babysitter (sooooo sooo so ridiculously easy for us to get a babysitter now!). Our regular babysitter Kathryn (she is in photo below, far right, with white headband) was available, so we planned for her to watch Meera. So, we arranged for her to take Meera to the dining hall for dinner. I’m sure this was the first time in the history of Lehigh University that a four year old ate in the dining hall without parents. Meera had dinner with Kathryn and a couple of her friends. All reports were that they had a great time (of course they did). I get a kick out of this whole thing every time I think of it — Meera, at age 4, having dinner in the dining hall, with a bunch of her 20-year-old friends. What a hoot!!!!!

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Our kids do not love the dining hall food. Braydon and I don’t either. We’d choose a meal made by me, or a lovely dinner out, most any day. But the dining hall is convenient, relaxed, and relatively healthy. So it works. It works in a big huge way. Here are some of the best things about it:

• On a busy work night, it is such an immense and huge relief to me to not have to get dinner on the table. Oh my gosh. Huge. Immense. Relief.
• At the same time, it is such an immense and huge relief to me to not have to: a) go to a nice restaurant that will be very expensive and where the expectations for our family members’ behavior will be unmanageably high, or b) eat at McDonalds, or some other such place, that would make me feel horrible [physically], from eating it, and would make me feel horrible [emotionally], from having my kids eat it
• The expectations for behavior are very low at the dining hall. It is loud and noisy. Lots of people are rowdy and lots of people are grumpy. My kids (and me! and Braydon!) fit right in at the end of the day when they/we are hungry and tired and just being the not-always-perfect-people-that-they/we-are. Just like the students we are sometimes rowdy and sometimes grumpy. That is all ok at the dining hall.
• If you try something and don’t like it, it is ok. It isn’t like we’ve just wasted $25/plate for a restaurant meal, or hurt Mommy’s feelings that we don’t like what she just slaved over the stove for the past hour making. This is an all-inclusive, all-you-can-eat buffet. If you don’t like it, try something else. We try to be cognizant and verbal about food wastefulness in the dining halls. But at the same time, it is ok if the kids try something, don’t like it, and then get something else. It is really ok.
• We wouldn’t want to eat in the dining halls every night, but once or twice a week we like to do it– it is fun to see students we know, to touch base with folks, to have a good laugh, or to chat it up with a football player (Kyle), or learn a new tidbit of inside info from a basketball player (Owen), or play chase-me-around-the-table-100-times-giggling (Meera). And while the kids all work the room, Braydon and I have that amazing luxury of just sitting there, the two of us, catching up on our day. No, it is not completely relaxing (we are in a college dining hall!!!), but it is very, very nice for us.
• No clean up. No dishes. No nothin’! Folks, that — in and of itself — is worth it!

We’ve done breakfast, lunch, and dinner in the dining halls. But the only thing we do regularly is dinner. There are two main dining halls on campus that we eat in regularly (for LU folks: Cort and Rathbone). We ate last night in the Upper UC Food Court for the first time (we were coming home late after K&O’s basketball game).

However, by far our favorite place for on-campus dining is the Faculty and Staff Dining Room (Asa Packer Dining Room) in the UC. This is a whole other league. The food is very high quality, it is waited tables, and it is all-around-the-polar-opposite of the regular dining halls in setting and atmosphere. It is only open for lunch on weekdays. And you rarely see students eating there (unless they are invited by a faculty or staff member). It is filled with faculty and staff Monday-Friday. The bambinos LOVE the food there, and consider it a real treat to be able to have lunch there any time they don’t have school.

above & below: eating at the Asa Packer Dining Room on President’s Day a couple weeks ago (the kids did not have school but LU did)

above: my current favorite picture of all time– Kyle with MaryAnn (my absolute favorite LU employee — I adore her — I’ve been sitting in her section for years) — he was having linguine with sun-dried tomatoes

below: Meera gets a brownie with pink sprinkles for dessert (super exciting!), Owen’s lunch was, according to him, “absolutely delicious!” (he asked MaryAnn to please tell the chef he said that) — he had Greek spinach strudel (he had 3 helpings of that), herb crusted cod, and grilled lemon chicken

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So, there you have it. Eating, as a faculty family, in the dining halls. Not for everyone, for sure. Definitely not for the faint of heart. But a real benefit of living on campus for us.

O, M, K at Rathbone

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