South Campus dining, deal or no deal?

There is a fantastic tradition on campus of complaining about Chartwells, the corporation that runs UM-St. Louis' cafeteria, catering and meal plans.

I have never eaten regularly at the Nosh or any of the other officially-sanctioned grub joints on campus, but I have to admit I was pretty pleased a year or two ago when I found out there would be a cafeteria in the Provincial House.

I commute by bike to UMSL every day, so I maintain a pretty formidable appetite during waking hours.

It was good to know if I was running ragged on my long class days at the Pierre Laclede Honors College on South Campus, I could quickly snag a piece of pizza without high-tailing it to North Campus in the fifteen minute window I had between classes. At least, it was that way last year.

We all know that UMSL gets better and better every year regarding tuition, on-campus living, parking costs and Metrolink crime, but I was rather confounded by the new cafeteria system at the Provincial House cafeteria this year.

Two days ago, in the wee hours of the morning, I smeared peanut butter and jelly on six slices of bread, and packed my energy drink; I was planning on taking my "real" calories in between classes at the Honors College.

The one thing that seems affordable-the single slice of Pizza for around $2 with tax-was to be my one solid meal after an early breakfast and a late dinner that day. The PB&Js were stay-awake-in-class/do-not-pass-out-when-standing-up-too-quickly food.

Sadly, when I went up to the cashier, I was informed that my options did not include "just a piece of pizza" (Just? You see the grease dripping off of this bad boy?), but rather, were two very narrow all-you-can-eat deals, both over $5 and both very similar.

I know there are proper athletes out there who can put away the quantities of food to justify all-you-can-eat Chartwells, and certainly champion consumers who do not need an excuse to do such a buffet justice (I used to have such a talent), but there is just no way I can possibly eat enough to make either of those deals a good value.

Luckily, the cashier was extremely helpful and let me slide that time. It seemed like this had happened more than once that day. After lunch, I remarked about the new cafeteria policy to other students.

I got three negative opinions of it inside fifteen minutes, just through casual small talk. "Rip-off" seems to be the recurring word.

Such narrow feeding options lead to bad things: they can discourage students from eating a properly sized (talking calories, here) midday meal, or they encourage overeating in order to make the price worth it.

They certainly are discouraging multiple, and cumulatively valuable, sales of single food items.

And I think I am correct in guessing that Chartwells is in it to make some profit, right?

I would love to be able to get a big greasy piece of pizza by itself on South Campus. But I would never pay the ridiculous all-you-can-eat sum to do so. I am not, and have not been for a long time, physically capable of consuming a ton of food at lunchtime, I just want some quality saturated fat, dough, and cheese.

I remember during summer classes at the Honors College, I once got a HUGE personal pan pizza at the Provincial House cafeteria for $1.79 plus tax: it was phenomenal. Let's do that again, that was great. And I am sure Chartwells would clean up regarding that whole profit thing.