Antolin German Professor Apuzzo English 160-23 15 October 2022

Notorious

We’ve arrived at SUNY New Paltz. We’re surrounded by beautiful trees and beautiful grass the sky is baby blue. The sun is out. Everyone’s smiling yep, we’ve arrived. As I walk out of my dorm to the dining hall, I really start to acknowledge the beauties this campus has. There were squirrels running around as if they were playing tag. Turtles and ducks swimming in the little lake and birds soaring through the sky. As I pass the bridge Peregrine dining hall is now in sight. It looked pretty from the outside. My mind started to imagine what types of delicious food they had. We’ve arrived at the notorious dining hall! I was excited to see the food options. I took a deep breath in. My nose was ambushed by a horrid scent. How could a smell like this come out of a place where humans are supposed to eat? The smell was so vulgar my nose felt beyond disrespected. Where am I? This can’t possibly be the dining hall, I thought to myself as I scratched my head. If it was up to me Peregrine dining hall should get demolished. The lack of creativity and redundancy in their menu is sickening, let alone eating the food there.

As I walked to the front door, I was found with another pleasant delight. There was a lengthy line that seemed to move at a speed of 1 mile per hour. Great! Who doesn’t love to wait in a long line? As I made my way to the top of the stairs, I noticed the reason the line was long was that the workers were casually talking and swiping the cards at a snail’s pace. As I walked around the dining hall to look for food, I noticed there was a decent number of choices to choose from. There was pizza, burgers, fries, pasta, rice, chicken, etc. I decided to grab the most familiar

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option which was pizza and a chicken sandwich with fries. The fries were nice and crispy, almost reminded me of McDonald’s elegant golden fries. As I bit into my sandwich, I was thinking of what to complain about, but I couldn’t. The chicken was crispy and juicy. Overall, I couldn’t complain about my first meal. I was still quite hungry, so I decided to grab some pasta from the pasta table. The pasta looked great, it was nice and curly, and the sauce looked amazing. I was excited. I poured a decent amount of pasta on my plate and poured some sauce over it. As soon as I took a bite, I immediately spat it back out. I was shocked. How could they serve this? The sauce on the pasta was extremely salty. I was beyond confused. Do they pour a bucket of salt into the sauce? This “pasta” is a mockery to Italian culture. My ears felt like they were burning. I snatched my plate off the table and with no hesitation threw it out.

I came back to the dining hall the very next day but this time in the morning. As I walked in, I noticed that the horrific scent was still there. I looked around for the breakfast options and I noticed that there are not as many options when it comes to breakfast. The only option outside of the main food spot was fruit near the chef’s table. As I went to grab some pineapple, I noticed a lovely surprise. A fly was on it. So, I kindly declined. As I entered the main entrance. I noticed there were waffles, French toast, tater tots, and eggs. So, I grabbed a little bit of everything and sat down. Another thing to take into consideration is that the only drinks available are the ones in the drink dispenser and they are always the same thing. The only options are lemonade, water, Sprite, coke, and about 4 other drinks. I don’t know about you but drinking the same 7 or so drinks every day gets extremely tiring. The first thing I noticed when I tried to cut up my waffles was that they were extremely hard. So that immediately was a turn-off. As I took a bite it was as if I was taking a bite out of cardboard. They didn’t taste terrible, but they weren’t good. The eggs were scrambled eggs, but I renamed them mushy eggs. The eggs were super mushy and liquidly. On the other hand, the French toasts and tater tots were magnificent. The French toast

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was soft and golden, and the tater tots were decently hard and crunchy. The music in the morning was also fairly good. They had some nice soft music in the background which helps you focus if you want to do work while eating or if you want to just relax while making an effort to “enjoy” your meal.

We students pay around 4,000 dollars for the food here. Yes, I said 4,000 it’s not a typo. You’re probably calling me an idiot and I don’t blame you. Seems very foolish to pay 4,000 dollars for food I would never eat outside of campus. What makes it worse is as a freshman we spend most of our time eating at Peregrine’s because of our meal plan. Yes. I’m basically forced to eat here every day.

After eating at Peregrine Dining hall and observing their menu for about a solid week. It’s safe to say that the best time to eat at Peregrine Dining hall is during the morning. Any meals past the morning time should not be considered edible. I’m convinced that the putrid scent that roams the dining hall must be the ghost of a former student punishing them for serving the revolting meals that they call “food.” After a week of eating here I was able to memorize the menu and no it’s not because I have a good memory it’s because they serve the same food every single day. Their lack of creativity and diversity is truly sickening, it’s as if they don’t even try. Oh, wait they don’t.