It’s Not Your Grandfather’s School Cafeteria Anymore

(Originally published 1/20/16)

I have very few fond memories of high school. One, however, is the institution of fine learning’s cafeteria. Of course, I was a teenager back then—in the colorfully scintillating 1970s—with teen culinary tastes and peculiar gastronomic desires. I salivated over certain foods then that might very well leave me cold today. I truly don’t know if I’d appreciate the school’s exceptionally gooey Friday “grandma slices” of pizza or cardboard-textured Wednesday roast beef wedges (with optional Au jus)—personal favorites—as much now as I did when Jimmy Carter was president. I wonder, too, how my adult palate would take to the “Mashed Pot” served with the aforementioned roast beef wedge. Yes, that’s what the space-challenged cafeteria special board read every Wednesday. Were he still among the living, Cardinal Francis Spellman might have cried foul.

Anyway, while perusing my alma mater’s website recently, I came upon a link to its “cafeteria menu,” which I thought strange. When I clicked on it, a PDF file opened up with this week’s—Monday through Friday—menu. And it was the polar opposite of what I recall with such fondness. I remember that in addition to the daily specials, there was an always and every-day alternative: the ubiquitous hot dog. Frankfurters were thirty-five cents when I was a freshman; fifty cents, when I was a senior. Believe me: They were worth every penny and then some.

Suffice it to say: There are no dogs on today’s cafeteria menu. In fact, the place has been dubbed a “café” now and is run by a culinary outfit. (I won't hazard a guess as to what happened to all the cafeteria ladies.) This contemporary bill of fare features categories like “Chef’s Table,” “Jump Asian,” and “Tuscan Bistro.” Icons identify which foods are gluten free, vegetarian, and vegan. The vegetarian side dish for January 20, 2016 was “Risi e Bisi Rice, Roasted Zucchini, and Tomatoes.” The only thing resembling a vegetable—outside of potatoes—that I recollect eating in the school cafeteria was sauerkraut on my hot dog. It was the first and last time I sampled that shredded cabbage mush. Sauerkraut, though, taught me a valuable lesson: Appealing aromas don’t necessarily translate into taste sensations, particularly when they turn a perfectly edible wiener roll into a grotesque sponge. (The cafeteria ladies had to keep the lunch lines moving. Draining the sauerkraut before putting it atop the frankfurter didn’t happen.)

So, a long time ago on a Wednesday afternoon in wintertime, I enjoyed a roast beef wedge—with Au jus—and a mashed pot side in my school cafeteria. Today, I could have ordered “Chicken Scallopini Scampi,” “Hunan Chicken and Hong Sue Pork,” and “Fruited Barley Lentil Soup.” I could also have a refillable debit card to pay for it—a lunchtime E-Z pass. For sure: It’s not your grandfather’s school cafeteria anymore. Trouble is: I’m now the grandfather. How did that happen?