May 19, 2024
#blog
We need to talk about college food. Or maybe "Gen Z food" is more fitting.
No, not dining hall food. That sucked.
In my second year of college, I went with some friends for dinner. I was told we were going to an Indian place. When we arrived, my expectations were completely shattered. We weren't going to be eating traditional Indian dishes, no no no, instead it was a Subway-style build-your-own-bowl-or-wrap setup that happened to have a lot of Indian-themed options for toppings.
I was so confused. It felt like a fun experiment for a menu at best and a blemish on an entire much-revered cuisine at worst. But I soon realized that this wasn't the first time I had eaten at a place with this design that you wouldn't expect. Many other places across many different cuisines adopted the trend of "bowls" that you could build by throwing together whatever toppings you want. The bowlificiation of food.
For a long time, I had wondered why this was the case. But it seems very simple. The demographic for these places is 95% college students. And what do college students want? Quick, cheap, and simple food that is just that little bit healthier than your mega-billion-dollar fast food chain that is definitely not funding a genocide or something. What are you talking about? That would be so weird! Anyway, this bowl trend works perfectly for our needs. Something we can grab in between classes that is easy to make and easy for us to comprehend. But there is one other element of the equation.
Snackpass is this app that took off around my university campus and quite a few others around America. You basically order food from a place in advance, it comes packaged in a plastic takeout box, and every time you order you can send "points" to a friend that they can redeem to get things like a free drink or side or whatever. It works perfectly for our needs. Only have a 30-minute lunch break before your next class? No worries, you can make the order just as you're getting out of your previous class and it'll be ready as soon as you arrive at the restaurant. Perfect! Well, not quite.
I've never worked at a place that uses Snackpass, nor do I know anyone that has, but I just get the feeling that this app is killing the dine-in experience at a lot of places. If the overwhelming majority of folks are ordering food just to pick it up and leave, like they're an Uber Eats driver, or at best they eat it inside the place but still in those single-use takeout boxes rather than reusable cutlery, where on earth is the atmosphere of the place? And don't get me started on the environmental impacts (I kinda have started, you can infer from the previous sentence).
I'm lucky to have food from a variety of different cuisines all a couple blocks from campus, many of whom were opened by immigrants hoping to create a homely vibe. If the whole experience of getting food becomes automated and standard across everywhere you go, then the restaurant just becomes this place you pass through to obtain sustenance, rather than an experience in and of itself. My ultra-neurospicy brain doesn't care that much, but deep down I know that this is yet another symptom of the growing trend of American sameness, maximal efficiency, and venture capital encroaching on much-loved local businesses.
Some of my favorite places near my campus are those that don't use Snackpass and thus require you to dine in to experience their food. I don't think that's a coincidence.