italianfoxmom

Can you share the name of this place?:
"you can get these amazing dumplings at a little shop on the Downtown Mall."
I would like to try them next August..

archrival

What do the food places offer for people who don't meat (other than salads)?

shoebox10

There's pizza, pasta, and vegetarian dishes (they vary). Everything in the dining hall has a sign and it'll say "vegetarian" or nothing to signal dish types. I have a friend who eats regularly (almost daily) in the dining halls and she's vegetarian, and she never complains. She's a big fan of Ohill's chili, as well as veggie sandwiches, and some of the pastas.

Dean J

Himalayan Fusion is on the Downtown Mall. They have the closest patio to the Charlottesville Pavilion, which makes it a great place to eat and hear the concerts going on down there.

The dumpling place is called "Marco & Lucca", but everyone just calls it the dumpling place or holds onto the old "dumpling window" from when it was in a tiny space on a side street. The owners are opening another shop in that old location (with different food).

Vegetarians or near vegetarians are so common these days that dining halls, regardless of where you go, will have plenty of appropriate options.

barboza

I have to warn you that veg options in the dining hall are extremely poor. You will almost have to stick with salad and a vegetarian pizza/burrito every day - well, at least in Newcomb.

laxguy8947

Don't get unlimited! No one eats three meals a day in the dinning hall. In fact, I don't think I've eaten three meals at the dinning hall in one day ever!

Personally, I think even 15 meals a week is just too many. I got tired of the dinning hall pretty quickly. I had plus 13 last semester and am on plus 10 now. I've never once tried to get into the dinning hall and not had any meals left.

tweety43

How many meals you want depends on how likely you think you are to eat in the dining halls. As a first year, I had to take plus 15 and because the dining hall hours did not work with my schedule i would end up buying lunch from either pav, crossroads or some other cafe on grounds + coffee at greenberry so my plus dollars finished real quick and and i ended up not using several of those 15 meals that I could. This semester I'm on 10+ and I have more plus dollars so it is much more convenient for me because I dont really eat in the dining hall. next semester I will be on 50 meals per semester from dining halls.

On the other hand, my friend has plus 17+, eats almost every meal in the dining hall and has so many plus dollars left that she's now buying random stuff just to use it up.

rcc0324

I was going to go with the plus 13 but then I realized that for losing the two meals a week by not having the plus 15 you only get 50 more plus dollars... I'm not sure if that makes much sense considering you can always add on plus dollars, so I'm going to go with the 15 I think.

vistany

The other strange thing I heard is that if you go to the caferteria to say meet a friend but don't intend to eat, or just get a drink, the act of swiping your card is like buying a meal.

Is that true?

Dean J

Vistany, that's how all-you-can-eat dining halls work. You swipe your card to enter...what you do after that is up to you.

davethevaskir

I think if you get the 15 meal per day plan, you wont mind swiping your card for just a drink. . . because there will probably be a day where you roll out of bed, run to two classes, and then *boom* its lunchtime. Additionally, on the weekends, they have brunch and dinner, and you probably won't want to get brunch twice.

So while yes, the extra 3.80 or so a week probably doesn't pay off, i suspect you'll get better mileage out of the money with the 13. Depends on who you are. I typically skip either breakfast or lunch, or have it in my dorm.

galoisien

Okay I happen to be a student with extremely tight finances that also happens to have a taste for ethnic foods (because I was born in Singapore) ....

The dining halls seem to have pretty good standard American fare, but I was wondering if there was any way to get *affordable* ethnic food. Any second year immigrants or international students whose stoves I could borrow?

I think unless I start putting on weight or something, Unlimited seems pretty attractive to me -- you can enter without any guilt that you're wasting a meal. Of course, I have less funds to use for ethnic foods that way.

barboza

Himalayan Fusion is indeed amazing! Dean J, I would love to hear some of your personal favorite dishes there. I never fail to order the vegetable samosas and the garlic naan, and I always like their chicken tikka. Don't forget to try their mango-yogurt drink named mango lassi.

vicente

Some people have told me that Milano on 29 is good but I've heard from visitors from India that it is bad, so...

galoisien

Suppose that you like cooking, you don't feel like splurging on restaurants, and you find the dining hall menus good but not completely satisfying. (There's hardly anything spicy on those menus!) I'm sure there must be some incoming first years like those?

But from what I've heard, first years generally don't get access to cooking facilities. Maybe it's possible to get work-study in the kitchens and edit the menu a little bit? Haha.