Oh college...

The tricky part about writing a blog about food and attending college is sometimes I just forget to eat. Or I just eat chips and hummus, maybe throw a few veggies in my mouth or grab an apple as I'm running out the door. And I cannot tell you (actually, I'm rather embarrassed, so I choose not to tell you) how many times I got chinese and mexican takeout. So with that exciting diet, I found it hard to find something to write about, or the time...

But a couple of weekends ago I went to visit a friend at the University of New Hampshire. At first UNH appeared Celiac-friendly. They had a "gluten free" area where there was a toaster and some condiments and a refrigerator to store gluten free breads, waffles, and bagels. However, it had been awhile since I last ate in a dining hall, and I guess because it has been so long since I've had what I call an "episode," I let my guard down. Big mistake. I had a burger (without the bun) a salad and cooked zucchini for lunch on Saturday and ended up getting extremely ill. My poor friend had to deal with me running to the bathroom the entire day and we had to cancel our evening plans. Of course I felt horrible for ruining her weekend, and so stupid for letting something like this happen, I'm usually so careful! I hounded my school's dietician for weeks for goodness sake, why would I eat at a dining hall without asking the manager a million questions? But who wants to be that difficult? Well, we do if we want to stay healthy! I need to constantly remind myself of that!

After I did a little research on the UNH dining halls, I found that the burger contained wheat. It was one of those times someone just decided to throw in flour "for good measure" (I find this a lot, and get quite annoyed). But the good thing about UNH, and I would have seen this if I had been paying more attention to what I eat instead of the endless chitchat, is they list all the ingredients on a little card next to the food, making the dining hall very allergy-friendly for all.

So leave it to me to get sick at one of the easiest dining halls to eat at...