​​Eating Well as a College Student

College is usually thought of as a time marked by the consumption of large amounts of fast food, instant dinners, and generally poor health. Students who have been accustomed to living at home for the first 18 years of their lives may simply lack the skills and foresight to plan their meals effectively or may find themselves in kitchens that are smaller or less well-equipped than those in which they were raised.

There are many reasons university students struggle to eat well. While living independently for the first time may be one reason college students suffer from poor nutrition, the desire to combine studies with social opportunities and career advancement coupled with a general lack of funds may provide more reasons that cooking healthy food generally takes a back seat to other pursuits during this time. University dining facilities typically emphasize preparing large amounts of food in bulk rather than quality or health, meaning that eating high-quality, tasty food is even more difficult to find in college.

The resulting weight gain, jokingly referred to as the “Freshman 15,” can quickly materialize into poor life habits which threaten to follow young adults well into the future. However, it is also possible to utilize college as a unique experience to develop the ability to prepare and budget for quality food, thus developing good health and positive life skills in the process. By consciously deciding to eat healthily and using a simple set of rules outlined below, you can ensure that you get the most out of your college years, even when living with limited cooking facilities and having a small budget.

Meal Planning is Critical

Planning meals in advance may be the single most important aspect of eating healthy as a college student. Knowing more or less what you will be eating for the week will positively impact all aspects of the cooking process. First, it will allow you to know exactly how much of each ingredient to buy and avoid spoilage or overfilling your refrigerator and budget accordingly. Second, you can roughly calculate how much time it will take you to cook (freeing up time for studies and other activities) and ensure that you have enough time to fit cooking and eating into your densely packed schedule as a student.

While it is not necessary to plan your meals with the precision of a space shuttle launch and you may feel the need to switch things up or simply grab a burger or pizza from time to time, having a well-formed meal plan will give your eating and meal prep a general sense of predictability.

Another critical dimension of planning is choosing simple recipes built around staple foods like rice or pasta, which are cheap filling, and well-suited to most balanced diets. These staples are generally cheap to buy, and easy to prepare.  However, simplicity and affordability are by no means necessarily a byword for bland and tasteless, as you can mix the proteins, vegetables, and toppings with these basic foods (see suggestions below).

With experience, you will quickly learn which combinations work the best and come up with innovative combinations to mix things up. You will also become more efficient at making your favorite dishes, leaving you with as much time as possible to study, socialize and enjoy your life.

Keep it Simple

While we are all keen on displaying our full culinary prowess from time to time, a more realistic approach is to keep it simple most of the time to save time and money. A simple egg dish such as scrambled eggs with vegetables and toast, or pasta combined with tuna fish and tomato sauce is satisfying, quick to make, and provides multiple nutrients in a time and cost-efficient way. 

Overcomplicating things risks leading to higher prices, more time to cook and clean up, and may discourage you from continuing to cook for yourself when you see these benefits diminished. While you may wish to cook extravagantly from time to time, keeping it simple is generally the way to go.

Mixing it Up

As mentioned, using simple ingredients doesn’t mean you have to eat bland food. A dish such as mac and cheese can easily be enhanced by adding broccoli or proteins such as bacon, sausage, or chicken while simple oatmeal or yogurt can be made more colorful and tasty by adding healthy toppings such as fruit, chocolate chips, and honey (in fact simple switching the fruit you add to yogurt or breakfast every day (or every few days) can make it an entirely different experience, keeping breakfast simple and interesting.

Meal Prepping

Meal prepping is a strategy commonly used by busy people to ensure that they can eat healthy food throughout the week. The basic idea is to prepare the components of multiple meals at once, concentrating on making your food at a single time so that you are left relatively free from doing so throughout the week. This process usually takes under two hours and allows you to make food almost instantaneously throughout the week.

For example, if dinner throughout the week consists of a salad with a different combination of vegetables and protein each evening, the vegetables can be cut in advance, allowing you to simply heat the protein and add the vegetable combination you want each night, dramatically reducing prep time. Adding a different dressing and simple toppings such as sunflower seeds and breadcrumbs can leave you with an entirely different experience each time.

Storing Ingredients and Prepped Meals

Tupperware and a freezer go a long way in allowing you to store ingredients and food over long periods. For example, freezing steamed vegetables such as broccoli and cauliflower or proteins such as grilled chicken breasts or salmon filets leaves you with ready-made components, which you can simply heat and add to meals in the future. However, make sure to plan your meals and keep track of how much of your frozen goods you are using so that you don’t unexpectedly run out at an inconvenient time.

Conclusion

Cooking for yourself while in university may seem burdensome compared to other things you can be doing in this critical period of your life. However, it is important to note that since this is the first time being independent for many people, learning good life habits such as how to cook yourself (and later your loved ones) a decent meal is an investment worth making. This is especially true because bad habits formed during your university years may follow you in subsequent years, leaving you less healthy and self-aware and potentially costing you money in the form of take-out food, which can be quite expensive. It, therefore, pays to develop good habits as early as possible.