You've graduated to the 85 block meal plan...now what?
You graduated to the 85 block meal plan…Now what?
Congratulations! You’ve either made your way into a Johnny apartment, or you live off campus and still want the Janz experience. Maybe you somehow convinced or bothered the SLO office enough to give you this meal plan. Either way, welcome.
You are still paying money for this meal plan, so keep taking advantage of it while you finesse your newfound or rediscovered cooking skills. So what is the 85 block meal plan and how should you use it? You will get 85 meals for this semester in total. Don’t freak out. It’s actually better than you might think. You can still get one meal from Janzow every weekday until Christmas break. And when Thanksgiving break comes along, you will have an extra five meals to use when SLO makes us leave campus for the week!
The 85 meal plan gives you $200 dining dollars/Bulldog Bucks/flex dollars, and that’s something to celebrate. The unlimited meal plan gives you $150 and the 190 meal plan gives you $100, which I don’t completely understand, but oh well. What’s the difference between dining dollars, Bulldog Bucks, and flex dollars you ask? Well, they are the same thing. Confusing? Yeah. You use your dining dollars at the dining hall, Doghouse, or 10:31. Bulldog Bucks do exactly the same! They are just funds that your friends or family can add to your account. Bulldog Bucks is just a fancy term for dining dollars because dining dollars is boring. As for flex dollars, they are the same thing. So there you have it.
Getting to have the 85 meal plan can be a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing if you want to save around $1,000 or if you have food allergies and could barely eat anything in Janz. It’s also great if you want to start cooking for yourself and feel more independent. It’s not so much a blessing if you have never cooked before, have never wanted to cook before, or you don’t want to spend money on groceries. But you are most likely splitting the bill with roommates. Key words, most likely. Splitting the bill can go many different ways. What my friends and I did was make a shared list of groceries we all wanted or needed and split the price of the groceries we were going to share. You just have to find which way works best for you and your squad.
Now that all of the extra lines are smoothed out, here's what you will need to figure out next. What do you like to eat for breakfast? Lunch? Snacks? Dinner? Second Dinner? If you are someone who needs things to be done quickly, I would suggest meal prepping. If you’re someone who puts things off until the last minute, like myself most times, then I would guess you are usually making meals on the fly.
So have you thought of what you’re going to eat yet? If not, here are some of my recommendations:
Chobani flips - because I’m not a plain yogurt type of gal
Banana peanut butter tortilla
A fried egg or two
Scrambled eggs
Fruit
Toast
Bagels
Lunch is usually up in the air. I make the decision to eat at Janz for lunch or dinner. You gotta put all 85 meals to use. A few easy lunch and dinner options:
Macaroni and cheese
Grilled Cheese
Salad
Sandwich
Chicken Nuggets
Spaghetti
You can also brown some hamburger and have lots of meal options like tacos, hamburger helper - just get creative with it. You can do the same thing with chicken whether that's ground chicken, shredded chicken, baked chicken, or grilled chicken.
When in doubt, it never hurts to make a Google search, look up a Youtube video, or use that meal swipe. So welcome to the 85 meal plan. It’s time to be more of an adult now and do your dishes. Good luck.