UMass chef offers tasty fare instead of the dreaded chicken puck

It got better. Across the way was a Vietnamese noodle station, with a chef taking custom-made orders. I had my pho prepared in a curry broth, with tofu, carrots, and mushrooms tossed in.

Because UMass recently went trayless, to curb waste and water usage, I set my bowl and chopsticks down at a booth and continued my tour with Toong.

Around the corner, chefs stir-fried tofu, shrimp, beef, or chicken in less than 40 seconds, asking students whether they wanted their dish mild or spicy. A dim sum buffet featured dumplings, steamed pork buns, and sticky rice wrapped in lotus leaves – another authentic ethnic dish I never thought would turn up at the college dining hall.

All the flavorful aromas reminded me of the street food I ate at the bustling night markets during the year I lived in Taiwan. And the enthusiasm of Toong, who pushed plate upon plate of food at me, reminded me of my Chinese mother.

Thankfully, the UMass cuisine – developed with the help of culinary stars Martin Yan, Suvir Saran, Roberto Santibanez, Mai Pham, and Mollie Katzen -- wasn’t strictly Asian.

Five varieties of pizza sizzled in a brick oven. A chef dished out freshly sliced herb-roasted pork, while students nearby grazed the 42-foot-long salad bar. Student-athletes jockeyed for the beef sliders.

This was a far cry from what my colleague Maria Sacchetti, a 1991 UMass grad, remembers. Students in her era subsisted on "chicken pucks" (chicken patties shaped like hockey pucks), iceberg lettuce, and beef stroganoff -- "stuff that smelled bad and tasted worse."

"I never looked forward to going to the dining hall," said Sacchetti, flabbergasted -- and envious -- of the array students today can choose from. "It's just something I had to do to survive."

Since Toong took over UMass Dining 10 years ago, the number of students on a meal plan jumped nearly 70 percent to 14,000 – including those who live off-campus.

Word around town is that students at nearby Hampshire, Smith, Mt. Holyoke, and Amherst colleges – who are allowed to cross-enroll in one another’s schools as part of the Five College Consortium -- schedule their UMass-Amherst classes around lunch time to take advantage of the food.

Nearing the end of my feast, Toong tempted me with dessert – bite-size portions of crème brulee, tiramisu, fruit tarts, and oven-fresh chocolate chip cookies baked every 20 minutes.

But I couldn’t eat another bite. I was running late for a meeting at Amherst College.