Dining Services Through the Years: A Marist Senior’s Take on Campus Dining

A photo of different food options from the Murray Dining Hall. Photo by Ava Kaloz '25

As Marist University has continued to evolve throughout the years, so too has on-campus dining, with options, cafes and even menus constantly rotating. Today, upperclassmen can look back at the food options that once existed but have since disappeared, and with that comes both excitement for current options and frustration and disappointment for the missing options we once craved.

For underclassmen who don’t know, until two years ago Marist offered food trucks as an alternative dining option on campus every week. Alternating between BBQ trucks, plant-based eats and acai bowl pop-ups, “Food Truck Day,” which came once a week, was a campus favorite. 

Abigail Boender ‘25, a senior at Marist, reflected on the changes in the dining plans. For the past two years, she has lived in “Gartland [where the trucks] would come once a week and they would park there, [outside of McCormick] and now they’re gone!”

This is a reality that she strongly conveyed through her disappointment in wanting to have access to the same options upperclassmen had years ago. 

Elaborating further, Boender addressed how Marist Dining in North End has gotten “worse” when it comes to wait times and quality. As she expressed her frustration about the changes to the dining options available here, I found myself agreeing more and more with the points she made. 

North End not only offered food trucks, but according to Boender, they had “chicken tenders, personal pizzas, paninis, Italian food – all of which made North End [characteristically good]. [In addition], all your friends could go to one place and order from one place because instead of having North End as four separate restaurants to order from, employees were getting orders from one source.”

Meanwhile across campus, Boender stated that she wants to have the classic, simple options that the Marist Dining Team used to provide, such as a basic grilled cheese with french fries. Instead of crafting “artisan, whole-wheat bread, herb spread, five-course cheese, et cetera, et cetera sandwiches,” she wants more options that are standard comfort foods. I’m sure many other students can agree. 

Between grilled cheese, chicken bites, mac and cheese balls and homemade sandwiches fresh every day, it is safe to say that we all feel a bit of melancholy over the food options we once loved that are now gone. 

When asked about other on-campus locations such as the cafe at Steel Plant, Boender explains how she misses the fact that food from the Steel Plant Cafe was handmade every day. In addition, she went further to explain how she misses the interactivity of how ordering on campus used to be. 

“I like talking to people and going up to them to say, ‘Hey, can I get a croissant with egg and cheese with, [for example], no egg.’ But now I have to type it into the comments on GrubHub, and most of the time, if I have a request, it isn’t even seen.”

If there was one change that affected Boender most, however, it would be the removal of one coveted item: The Cuban Panini.

Elaborating in detail on all of the ingredients in her beloved sandwich, Boender explained how “they took it off the menu and replaced it with a ‘spicy chicken’ or some other sandwich that has banana peppers or roasted red peppers like most other on-campus locations.”

Feeling reminiscent of my campus favorites, which now no longer exist - the lattes that Steel Plant Cafe used to serve without up-charging students for flavor pumps, the handmade breakfast sandwiches throughout campus and the personal cheese pizzas of North End – I can’t help but feel a sense of sadness, myself, over the now-gone food options that I loved.

With Marist now a University, I can’t help but wonder if the on-campus dining options will change again and maybe — just maybe — our old favorites will resurface.