How to steal from BC's Dining Halls’ (Satire!)

This article was inspired by the essay by the fourth guest on Keepin Kozy, Mahbod Moghadam, who wrote an article: “How to Steal from Whole Foods.” Considering the reaction he got for his essay, I feel the need to write a few of disclaimers that I aim not to offend, but to make a point on a super pricey dining system. I struggled so much with BC Dining prices that I made BC Bites. Also this stuff probably won’t even work during the next, Covid-impacted semester. Lastly, if you are a representative or worker at BC dining, feel free to use anything I write in this article as a means to heighten security. 

Most people I know at Boston College have stolen food at one point from the dining halls. This is because the dining hall is super overpriced. Other kids end up having thousands of dollars go to waste because they just eat less or supplement their meals with takeout.

I personally stopped sneaking food after Sophomore year when I read Augustine’s story of stealing pears in my Pulse class with the great Father Ken Himes. There is a youthful joy in doing the mischievous, and that is what this article is about. This said, a much better way of scoring free food from the very overpriced Boston College dining halls is through joining the BC Bites Facebook group.

Anyway, here is the plan (pre Covid) in how to eat when you are strapped for meal bucks during your time at BC, and you will be, trust me. 

Snacking:

This is quite obvious.  Point of this strategy is literally just to just go hungry and eat the food before you pay. There’s a gradient of boldness of this strategy, ranging from just taking food from the self serve fruit/veggie bars to literally eating a full meal before you actually check out (once saw a guy literally eat a whole piece of steak before leaving). Most every one snacks a little on their fries, potatoes, or carrots and hummus before they check out, it's morally not terrible. You may need to take a few more classes in the philosophy/theology departments, though, if you are consistently eating a full pizza before you check out. 

Hiding:

Hiding is the most overt, and the most stealing of “stealing” strategies I see kids do.

It pretty much can range from when kids walk off without paying (this used to be super common in my Freshman and Sophomore years during late night, but they really cut back on this when they moved late night to Addies, still happens during crowded times at the dining halls) to the most common technique, getting a double order of chicken from the burger bar and hiding the second piece under a lot of rice (I’m still trying to find one person who hasn’t done this during their time at BC). 

This is also big in the breakfast scene, since none of the breakfast sandwiches come with actual meat, I’ve seen a lot of kids who just open their sandwich wrapper up, put three pieces of bacon in it, and close it up (as an aside, how on earth does bacon legitimately cost one dollar per strip? What the hell, BC). 

There are other ways I see people hide food. Stuff like putting a Powerade in the drink holder in one’s backpack (Also quite popular to just chuck a cold sandwich/chips into one's backpack works pretty well at a crowded dining hall [explained below]). There’s also filling up a thermos of congo rising, and not paying for it. 

  In some real petty mischief, I’ve also seen kids who get a full cup of milk (yep, people do actually do drink milk by itself haha) and say it’s Sprite because soda costs less than milk in BC dining. Now if you are doing this, you really are a cheap fuck because you’re probably only saving like 10 bucks a semester or something like that, so you’re getting like one extra regular sized steak and cheese a semester, plus you have to deal with the guilt of doing wrong. That said, who am I to judge? I’m literally writing an article about how to eat for free.

Grafting:

I am going to plug the free food Facebook group again, haha. @BCBites is the best group on campus to join for you hungry students because it is a group dedicated to sharing information about left overs from events. It also markets events that have food at them, so joining this group means you get more culture and more food, total win-win. It's the best and most important group to join at BC, the premier legitimate way to graft. Plus, you fight food waste/could participate in a cool event. Wow, what a cool group, man.

Grafting is probably the most common way of “stealing” from the BC dining halls. This is when you ask someone who you are friends with to use their card to pay for your meal. The interesting thing about this, is that it is one of the most logical aspects of Boston College dining. As I said in the disclaimer, some people eat more than others, and by having it as a “pay per item” system, some kids are out of their meal plan money within the first two months, and others have literally thousands of their dollars go to waste. Grafting in this sense isn’t just okay, I honestly believe it's expected. Now here’s a huge tip most people are aware of, girls usually use a lot less of their meal plans so they typically have a lot left over, so lean on them towards the end of the semester. People are usually super chill about grafting, especially during their underclassmen years when they have to buy into the overpriced meal plan.

Note the dining hall:

Now it’s important to know each dining hall is different from the other. The Rat, at one point the most notorious place to snag/hide food, has recently started to up its security (what has happened to the rat’s interior design in the past few years has been an utter travesty. It was so much nicer when it had a dingy interior), and odds are you probably will get caught. A spot like Addies is impossible to steal from because you have to pre order your food, and you literally get a receipt of what you ordered.  A place like Lower is a lot easier because it's a much bigger space, and you can easily put a [freaking 5 dollar!] Odwalla in your backpack without someone looking at you.

Rush hour is your hour:

Note the time you go. If you go to any dining hall during the rush hours your odds of being able to sneak or hide food goes up a lot. It also helps with grafting since more people= greater chances that you will run into someone you know. The Rat is made for grafting, if you go there during lunch hours there’s an almost 100 percent chance you’ll run into someone you know.

Final disclaimer/the harsh reality:

The most important part about this article is knowing that it is SATIRE. Stealing is obviously wrong, as you all hopefully know from your Pulse, Perspectives, or Philosophy of the Person classes (never realized how many classes started with P’s).

That said… Here’s my actual point: we totally should have a buffet swipe style like they have in Columbia or Notre Dame. As I mention in the article, everyone has a different diet, and some kids do actually go hungry at Boston College because they can’t afford food once they run out of their meal plan. With things like individual bananas or bacon strips priced at a huge premium (I reiterate one dollar PER bacon strip). The system is designed for kids to run out of their meal plans fast unless they can afford to supplement their meals with takeout. The kids who can most afford takeout are the wealthier ones. So if you want, I could probably even go on some lame class division argument about this, but I won’t go there.

Anyway remember to join the BC Bites page, and I also have some more professional articles on this website, if you would wanna check them out!

Addendum:

Once again, as a small content creator I think stealing is terrible, I just also know that using that word will probably garner more attention for my writing, the Facebook group and my podcast. Also, and I obviously don’t have the data to support this, but most every student at Boston College I know has “stolen” some food, using at least one of the techniques I wrote above (literally everyone grafts), so let’s remember the log in eye bible verse, haha.

As much as I hate on the prices of food, there is a reason behind it-check out this article with BC’s dining people to hear their thoughts on food prices.

To administrators, this article is for you as well! You can use this as a way to cut back on the people who steal from the dining hall! But I hope when things normalize you consider buffet style.