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Will sledding on college trays soon only be a sad, somewhat clichéd memory?
USA Today chimes in on what may (or may not) be an accelerating trend: colleges eliminating cafeteria trays to cut food waste, and not incidentally, food costs. The online magazine Inside Higher Ed first reported on this back in January, focusing on Alfred University in New York, which went trayless, as cafeteria professionals apparently call it, last semester. The university switched after a test semester showed that trayless meals drastically reduced food and drink waste.
Now USA Today reports that an “astonishing 79% of the 92,000 students surveyed this spring by Aramark said they support trayless dining to reduce campus waste.” It’s a result that seems at least a little suspect, since less food waste means, theoretically, higher profits for food providers like Aramark. But nevertheless, the story estimates that the majority of the nation’s colleges will eliminate trays within the next five years.
Of course, if there were more food worth putting on the trays, it might be harder to dispense with them. I mean, I’d have wasted a lot less food in college if so much of what I took hadn’t turned out to be inedible. What we need is next-level cafeteria thinking like this from economist (and DC-area ethnic eating guru) Tyler Cowen, in response to the Inside Higher Ed story: “If I ran a cafeteria I would consider abolishing utensils, thereby encouraging South Indian and Ethiopian food, but I don’t expect that would be popular with all patrons.”
The cafeteria at the school I went to was run by Aramark (friends with the manager actually). While not all of the options were amazing every time the quality was actually pretty damn good. But you would also see people go and get one meal at one station, then a sandwich, then a big salad, and end up eating maybe half of it and dumping the rest. I think it's a good idea.
I agree that I sometimes get too much food because it's easy. But usually, it ends up necessary. I can fill a tray and still not find anything worth eating.
It probably comes down to the individual. I mostly agree with StrawberryF. The last time I was at a cafeteria comes to mind. I'd pile in whatever looked/smelled good without thinking. Sitting down to eat I would realize that not every thing I got tasted as good as it looked. About a third of the food went into the trash that one time. So it's probably a mixture of huge food portions and quality.
I disagree. I think it's not the poor taste that drives people to throw out so much food, it's that when you have a tray, it's much easier to take too much. You can pile it on and still carry it. I would never get 3 deserts if I had to carry each individual plate, but I routinely did so in my college cafeteria, then take a bite of each and throw the rest out.
Tray or no tray, if the food's inedible, it's headed for the trash. Instead of, or in tandem with, composting would be the greener way to go.
My favorite college food story was when the women of Mary Markley at University of Michigan went on a food strike and listed their complaints. They included virtually inedible food and small portion size.
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