The Food Thread: Running out, best/worst.

[try another castle]

My dorm head and I laughed one time about how sometimes the only thing you had to look forward to at this god-forsaken place was dinner.

For the record, I personally recall that most of RMA's food was pretty decent. (It made you fart a lot, though.) I know that the running springs survivors complained a lot about the grease content in the food down there. As for the RMA kitchen.. for a crew of staff who were forbidden to use things like white flour and sugar, and were relegated to cooking a meal for 150-200 students every day, 3 times a day, on a wood-burning stove, they did a pretty good job. However, you can only cook so much food with those kinds of restrictions.

Anyway, I totally forgot that we used to run out of food at RMA. I still don't remember it. I'm just going off of friend testimony.

I remember hearing people from running springs talk about it in these forums, and I would say to myself "Oh, how strange. I don't think that ever happened at RMA." Then I would think about us rushing the line, and I couldn't remember why we did that. To get the best piece of food? To eat your firsts fast so you could get seconds?

Then I was reminded a few days ago that we ran out all the time, and that the kids who didn't get any food got rolls and butter, which is why people rushed the line and hoped they got called up first. And why the staff dropped that "scarcity" joke on us and allowed it to circulate among all of the students. And why people mooed like cows when another group went up to get their food.

This probably explains why one of  my most common recurring RMA dreams are dreams of running out of food. Normally I am late up to the meal, and all of the food is gone and the kitchen staff are clearing off the buffet table.

I honestly don't remember if I ever ended up going without a meal and getting stuck with rolls. I know that I skipped some meals, though, if I didn't like what they were serving.

So, anyway, I was thinking about some of my favorite and least favorite things I ate there:

Any saturday they had pancakes with the fruit topping was a good saturday, IMO. Just as long as there was no rhubarb, cause I hate that shit. Fucking mutant celery.

The bacon that was made from the slaughtered pigs at the farm was the best bacon I ever had. Most people couldn't bring themselves to eat it, and I was like "Good. More for me."

I also liked the rather average BLTs. For some reason, a BLT for dinner after a really lousy rap helped out a lot.

And I was huge fan of the curry chicken. I don't know why. The curry wasn't very hot or spicy, but I just loved it.

Those weird fucking egg things... they were like, in some sort of muffin cup type foodstuff, like, I think made out of cornmeal, and there was an egg in it. I can't remember in what state, i.e. softboiled or whatever. But anyway, they were totally vile. yech.

One of my least favorite things to eat there was when peanut butter and jelly bagels were put out as a meal. Does anyone else remember this? For a snack, I can understand, but for lunch? The only thing that was less palatable than those bagels was the peanut butter. I totally forgot about this arrangement until one of my run-out-of-food dreams reminded me of it. Especially the enormous bowls filled with peanut butter and jelly. I'm sorry, but PBJ doesn't belong on a bagel. Trust me, I used to live in New York. I know these things.

If someone fucked a patch of dirt hot and heavy for about a day, then mixed it with water, and held it over a slow burning fire for a decade, it would probably taste pretty close to what eventually became known as "cowboy coffee". fuck that stuff was awful. And no sugar to sweeten it, either. Only honey. Is it just me, or were we not allowed to put milk in our coffee, either? I don't remember ever using any, and I like my coffee really blonde, so that doesn't make any sense at all.


Also, I still to this day refuse to eat honey nut cheerios. I just can NOT stand the way those things taste.

Not a big fan of screaming yellow zonkers, either. (oh,  yes, the sunday commissary. Didn't you just love that arrangement? School gives you a dollar. You give it back to the school in exchange for candy.)

My friend and I were laughing about those iced animal cookies that they sold at the pink lion that everyone was so crazy about. I  had a big assed bag in my footlocker as well. God, one of the best privileges about being in upper school was going out and buying real food, like instant coffee, ramen, animal cookies, and my absolute favorite, nestle quick chocolate milk mix.


Anyway, share your food stories. Especially if they have to do with running out, because I want to hear more about this, since I don't remember it.

[dishdutyfugitive]

Yes we ran out. For example, if the student population on a given day was 175 and we were having hamburgers they only made about 200 hamburgers.

Kids would take 2 at a time (get out your dirt lists) or eat their 1st by the time they sat down and went back for 2nds or 3rds. This means if you got called up last they were already out of burgers.

It was common for the 'good' meals. But never a problem for the bad meals.

Why no white flour/sugar?

Pass me some more 'Pigs in a blanket' you scarcity driven hording fellow alums.

[Anonymous]

I loved the CEDU food. Comfort food. Which I went from skinny to shapely within weeks.

I loved the taco bars. The roastbeef and mashed potatoes; the granola, pancakes, french toast....mmmmmmmmmmm!!!!

I stuffed myself silly.... it was my vice, my comfort.

And then I couldn't fit into anything, and a staff member told me that I had to make an announcement in front of the house asking my peers to help keep me from"eating my feelings."  Mind you, I was fat at all, still in single digits, but I had a little cheek to pinch!

So, an upper class student came up to me and told me, "Hey, I support you" and gave me this whole song and dance about "understanding..."  This whole fucking thing was ridiculous already and that announcement humiliated me, but when a staff tells you to do it...

So, shortly thereafter I went to my truth Profeet, and Laurie Saunders gave me shit for that announcement (I was Olive Oil next to her) and started reaming me. Guess who immediately follows suit, piling it on after her? My "understanding"older student who made a Bee Line to offer me his Jenny Craig pledge of support earlier!!!  I was incredulous.

And I just can't stop thinking of the buffet without linking food to that whole incident.  Damn, I can't even think about meat and potatoes at CEDU without thinking of a damn profeet.

But one thing for sure I can never recall a food shortage at CEDU-RS.  Hell no! Gotta weigh us down to keep us from being light on our feet.

[Anonymous]

Ahhhh - too funny.

Yes...Cedu RS was usually quite stocked and definitely made better arrangements to make sure everyone got food. There would be "food line monitors" to make sure you only took the amount you were supposed to.

For a while different sections of the cafeteria had to be called for "seconds."

It began to come out in raps as "scarcity." So if you were a 15 year old boy and just wanted to get a good fill of comfort food, now you could be subjected to indictments at raps.

For the first year I was at Cedu - they only had healthy cereal i.e. total, special K etc. (circa 89) Then some how we got Nut N Honey. It was freakin delicious. I remember waking up early just so I could get my hands on some Nut N Honey. All of a sudden the person who would dismiss you from the lodge into the cafeteria was your best friend. People would go nuts over that stuff.

After too many close calls with trying to get my hands on some decent cereal,  I was put on bans from "Sugar cereals." It was a total bummer.

I was also put on bans from granola which was pretty good as well. You were only allowed 2 scoops and the older student kitchen manager was there to make sure you were keeping in agreement.

I eventually got my "granola priveledges" reinstated.
CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT? What a joke...I was on bans from cereal.

Other meals that went really quick were:

Chicken McNugget night
Taquito night

[Anonymous]

Banned from cereal. You rebel, you.

So far, the ridiculous bans I've heard are:

1. from reading.
2. from the sun.
3. from cereal.

Cedu did some important work, no?

"We will help your child turn away from the nefarious influences of reading, cereal, and solar energy."

[dishdutyfugitive]

My friend was put on bans from the kitchen and the kitchen lady for trying to get his meal on.

[try another castle]

My dormmate was put on bans from the faculty (except two). She said it was the best restriction she'd ever been put on.

[Anonymous]

The kitchen ladies at RMA in the early to mid eighties rocked.  I had completely forgotten about running out of food.  Oddly, I have no memories of going hungry.   The home made rolls, coupled with butter certainly kept me fat.   The camp coffee paired with whole milk that still had the cream at the top -- oh baby.  I was chunky.  I remember trying to lose weight before graduation.  I went on a diet coke, grapes, and cigarette diet.  I think I lost 10 pounds, but I still thought I was fat.  Gosh, it was great to graduate.  

I have a distinct memory of sitting in a car, moving down the dirt road.  I remember approaching end of the road, and seeing the mail box and the back of the sign. I was so fucking happy!  The next chapter of my life was beginning.  I had grand plans.  What a great day.  I was out.

[try another castle]

Well, sure, someone can skip a meal and go on rolls and butter. In fact, the carbs with dairy/protein are good for you.

I was thinking more along the lines of the psychological impact. Like I said, sometimes the meals were all you had to look forward to. You come out of a particularly bad rap, and all you can think about are the burgers they are making for dinner. Then, bam, you get called up last and are stuck with rolls. That SUCKS!!!

[Anonymous]

i remember scarcity and being called for seconds.

i read in my journals that used to starve myself so i would get sick so i could get out of raps.

it was so obvious that they just didnt want you to be happy at all ever, except when you jumped through one of their hoops.  they wanted to be god.  but god is not as stupid as they are.

fuckers.  i am feeling very angry today.  i talked to my therapist about how i much better off i was when i was 14 than at 16 when i got out of there.  how much more i had already learned about myself, knowledge they distorted and tore out of my hands.

fucking life breaking ass holes.  demons.  motherfucking demons.  i spent 6 years in the church learning about having demons cast out of me, the science of faith.  if there is any such thing as demon possessed it is those fuckers like rudy bentz.  

i read in my journal that i was glad i was working with jill.  i did really respect her.  i did drink that fucking kool aid.  but i was a kid.  thats why there is a passage in the bible about having faith like a child, children beleive what you tell them.  

i hate that my parents allowed these fucking ass holes have total control over me rather than just letting myself have total control over me.  why did they trust some stranger over me?  because i was 14?  so therefor i was less trustworthy than these strangers?

i am so angry at the lack of trust that my parents displayed towards me because it ended up costing me 15 years of my life, that they chose to trust someone else rather than me.  of all the risks, it would seem that the best risk to take is the one that has the potential of teaching the individual something, and that can never be something that that individual has no say in.  it is just insane.  so stupid.  and i love my parents and dont want to hurt them but it makes me so angry that they did not see this!!!!!

even my therapist said today, its interesting that your brother could see that they were brainwashing you, but they couldnt!

[Psianide]

We had to be in challenge to drink coffee at NWA. I remember this pissing me off a lot and my always being out of agreement because I was getting coffee from upperschool friends and on visits. Tea was allowed to lower schoolers though.

Food worsts: smorg (leftover buffet), anything with the synthetic cheese substitute they used that browned but didn't melt (pizza was the worst offender). Blackened grilled cheese.

Food bests: ramen, taco bar, most sunday brunches they served (although the eggs always came as a solid block, and sometimes turned green).

[Anonymous]

Does anyone else remember the Friday potatoe bar? That was my favorite!!

[Anonymous]

After eating the potato bar almost every friday for 2 years - it's still hard for me to eat potatoes.

I won't even touch Shepards Pie on principle.
basic spaghetti is hard too. (Just like ragu and noodles)

I remember the green eggs on sunday as well.

Saturday night dinners I remember being pretty good. We would have to dress up and there were candles on the tables and table cloths. Was also a bitch to clean if you were on dish duty...which of course i always was.
I remember you used to have to bring a change of clothes with you down to the house. Then change back into your nice clothes after you REEKED of dishes and scrubbing pots and pans and sweat from how hot it was by the sanitizer....

wow - great memories.

[Anonymous]

i remember someone perky and gung ho doing a passover thing with latkes, and thinking how much they sucked, and how much better my mom's were, and hating that i was there.  

there was a girl who sang a song that i learned there that was about the holocost called dona dona, it was too perfect.

i was kitchen manager for  a long time.  i liked working in the kitchen.  i still love to cook.  sorry if the eggs sucked  i used to like to do sunday brunch, everyone liked it so much, so it was fun to help make it.

i still have  a scar on my finger form when i cut lettuce wrong one day!  being kitchen manager was fun.

[cedu91to93]

The latkas were the one year we decided we were going to do something for Hanukkah. I remember that too.

I don't remember the flavor of any of the food, but did gain 60 pounds there. My metabolism was ALL out of whack because I was anorexic so when I started eating normally, and all that was available to me was highly fattening food, OF COURSE I gained weight. I remember during the whole ordeal getting accused of purging (constantly being accused of it, nearly every rap.....what a pleasure). Um, excuse me, but if I was purging, woud I have gained 60 pounds??

At one point I was strongly encouraged to stay away from the kitchen. I wasn't put on bans from it, but I came close. The kitchen ladies I spoke with thought cedu was just weird, but they appreciated the job. Same with the guy who drove us to medical appts (and snuck us to baskin robbins!).

I don't ever remember there being a lack of food, but definitely a lack of healthy food or variety for those of us who chose not to eat particular foods.