Graphic by Carrie Clowers ’18
BY FALGUNI BASNET ’21
As the daily lunch rush begins, a crowd of people come flooding in to Mount Holyoke’s newest addition — the Dining Commons, popularly known as SuperBlanch. This is a chaotic hour for students, especially during the weekdays, as they hurry to find good seats, line up for food and then return to classes. There are piles of utensils on the dishroom conveyor as student workers and staff members rush around to keep things in order.
Since the long-awaited Dining Commons opened, people have had mixed opinions about the centralized dining system. While some think it is a good way to have spontaneous meetings, eat a variety of food items and generally enjoy the brand new space, others argue that it is almost always too busy and noisy, making it hard to navigate and find seats.
Cora Moss ’20 found that there are more healthy food choices at SuperBlanch. “The healthy options aren’t just salad, I especially love the wok station,” Moss said. And Moss is not the only one who feels this way: the wok station has been one of the most popular stations at the Dining Commons. “I particularly like the vegetable stir fry at the wok station,” said Carmen Lu ’20. “I was born and raised in Asia, and I am used to eating cooked vegetables every day, and so it was great to see that Blanchard now has that as a permanent station, which even allows us to create our own combination of vegetables,” Lu said.
Although many students agree that there is a lot more to choose from at the new Dining Commons, they also say that the choices of fruit just aren’t enough. “My favorite part is getting to make my own waffles, but then I don’t have enough fruit to choose from,” said Sorcha McCrohan ’21. Others also agree with McCrohan. “All I could find this morning were sad-looking apples,” said Moss.
Another critique from Cordelia Bellinson ’21 involves the accuracy of food labels. “I love the fact that there is a lot of variety and several vegetables to choose from, but the labeling system is very on-and-off. I have had things containing meats here inadvertently, and this never happened before SuperBlanch,” said Bellinson.
Dining staff also expressed their opinions on the new Dining Commons. “I just love seeing all the students eating together and having a good time,” said Karen Friel, a member of the dining staff who has been at Mount Holyoke for 15 years now. “It might be a little chaotic for everybody, but there’s new equipment, new steamers, a lot of different people (and we all are getting along very well), and we’re constantly learning new things, so it has been fun so far,” Friel said.
As many students express concern about the crowd during peak hours, the dining staff and student workers have been doing their best to smoothly run the shared dining space. “It is probably going to take a while for everybody to get into the groove,” said dining staff member Brian Smith. “Everything is pretty new right now, and students need to understand that.”