chicken parmesan and vegetable udon stir-fry

Those are the two entrees served for dinner last night. Why, I ask, would you ever serve chicken parmesan with udon? Aren't there a bevy of other side-dishes for chicken parmesan, most of which are fairly simple to prepare and are categorically "dining hall" foods, to chose from?

Also, for the record, it wasn't udon in that stir-fry, it was cellophane noodle.

(I had a grilled cheese for dinner. It was delicious.)

coconut congo bar, fair trade coffee

I was halfway through this "coconut congo bar" when I realized that this is my last semester at Harvard, and after three years of eating dining hall food I have very little recollection of what those three gustatory years were like. So, in an attempt to capture what I eat on a daily basis and share with the rest of you what Harvard University's dining hall serves, I created this blog.

Today's photo is from my lunch dessert: a cup of "Central Highlands Blend" fair trade coffee and a coconut congo bar. I commend the fact that Harvard serves fair trade food (our bananas are also), and attempts to make students aware of the social ramifications of fair trade and the plight facing many farmers and farm workers globally. This does not, however, make it good coffee. Socially conscious as it is (and yes, I do care about this a great deal), it tastes terrible. As my friend Greg says: "This stuff is like drinking jet fuel." Of course, he's a rather macho guy so he probably enjoys that. As for me, I like my coffee to be smoother and a touch less acrid.

I have an odd fascination with congo bars. The ones made by Rosie's Bakery on Massachussetts Ave. toward Porter Square are the best... moist, a touch sticky, and just butterscotchy enough. I'm partial to blonde brownies over the chocolate variety, for the record. The Harvard version features a crumbly crust of sorts (I imagine it was made in the same style as a graham cracker crust) topped with walnuts, chocolate chips, marshmallow, and dried coconut. When I first tried it, it was pretty hard, so I microwaved the bar for thirty seconds. This seemed to help, but on the whole I think it was a bit undercooked. Not undercooked in the sense that any of the ingredients need to be cooked, per se, but in that I would have liked to have the chocolate chips melty and the sugar in the crust less grainy. On the whole, very sweet and I couldn't finish the thing, but one of Harvard's better dessert creations.