Students line up in the dining hall to get food from the Homestyle Buffet. Photo by Joseph Lachance.
New Food, New Hours for Dining Services
The University of Rhode Island’s Dining Services will be expanding their options and hours this semester in order to increase the quality and accessibility of food for students with meal plans.
Pierre St-Germain, director of Dining and Retail Services, has worked to improve URI’s food quality and expand the hours of operation over the course of the past semester. St-Germain was hired by the University prior to the beginning of the academic year.
St-Germain has begun to diversify the menu primarily at Mainfare Dining Hall. As a result, there will be new food items introduced to the homestyle station.
“We have, for many years, had a fairly static menu,” St-Germain said. “It’s only changed for special events, so I am compelling my team to start editing the menus so that we have an ideally more seasonal, as well as more diverse menu. Ideally I’d like it to be broad-reaching so it’s not just limited to homestyle where you see these variances in the menu. I’d really like it to be every station we have, but baby steps.”
However, some students feel as if they haven’t seen as much change as they would like.
“I think they should expand the menu even more,” freshmen Paige Chakouian said. “I think it would be nice to have a few more options rather than having the same meals every week. I’m a really picky eater and I think for me it’s hard sometimes.”
St-Germain also revealed that new meal plans will be available for students who live off-campus. Students will have the option to purchase a meal plan that will offer combo swipes and ram account funds.
Mainfare dining hall hours will also expand. The dining hall will now be open earlier on the weekends.
“We moved Mainfare back, so now it opens at 9 a.m. with a continental breakfast, so even if you just want to grab something to eat, you can,” St-Germain said. “At 10 a.m. they start hot breakfast.”
The astros component of Mainfare that serves primarily hamburgers, hot dogs and fries will also extend its hours after spring break. In March, students will have the opportunity to eat at astros from Sunday to Wednesday until approximately 10 p.m.
“It’s going to be a combo swipe,” St-Germain said. “Because it wouldn’t be really like a meal, it’s more than a snack, but not an all you can eat situation. We’re also setting it up so students can take things to go, as well.”
Another major change to the dining halls is the transition from chicken patties to breaded chicken fillets.
“When I actually saw [a chicken patty], I realized that it was a formed-chicken product,” St-Germain said. “I think it’s maybe one of those throwback things to a bye-gone era, that had just kind of been held on to. I said ‘it can exist for one semester, and then it has to go and we cannot get chopped form products anymore. My team found a chicken breast fillet that we all agreed on and thought it was delicious.”
The development of Dining Services under St-Germain’s recent employment has promoted some major advancements for all dining halls and food retail services, and there is more to come in the future.
“As we move forward throughout the years, I’m hoping that we’ll be able to advance and better the food,” St-Germain said. “Not that it’s been bad, but I come from a culinary background so I tend to look very critically. I want to kind of put URI on the map.”
Currently, some students still have a difficult time despite the improvements that have been made.
Freshmen Emma Hayes, a vegetarian, struggles to get enough of her daily nutrients due to the limited dining hall options.
“The only way for me to get my protein in is the burrito bar in Butterfield, because if I’m not getting a burrito, I’m not eating beans, and there’s no real way for me to eat protein at the dining hall,” Hayes said. “As a college student with many things to handle such as hanging out with friends, finding time to exercise and studying, it’s important to have energy, but if I’m protein deficient it’s hard to do all that.”
St-Germain is looking for students to be a part of a Dining Services Student Advisory Board. Anyone interested in being on the board should contact Pierre St-Germain at [email protected].