What happens when mediocre food takes a turn for the comforting? Cafeteria Chronicler Alison Herman reports on what Saint Valentine brought to John Jay Dining Hall only yesternight. Sad you missed out? Mark your GCal for next Tuesday, when John Jay will take a stab at gumbo in honor of Mardi Gras. 

A John Jay Classic.

Uncreative couples on the ultimate John Jate and singles ready to take out their sorrows on innocent chocolate were greeted with an embarrassment of riches last night upon entering the dining hall: two triple-tiered chocolate fountains, one milk chocolate, one white, were laid out by the entrance, complete with strawberries, macaroons, and suggestively phallic bananas. The message was clear: Dining Services wasn’t messing around, and would stop at nothing to put you, your imaginary Valentine, and your shoulder to cry on, into an insulin coma.

Before the sugar onslaught, however, the nutritional formality of dinner needed to be taken care of. The food was, more or less, typical John Jay fare, with feebly attempted puns livening up the Valentine’s theme by dubbing the steak, “hearts” of sirloin, and cutting the grilled cheese into endearingly, um, cheesy shapes. The mashed potatoes and vegetables were both bland and in serious need of some salt, but the meat was the closest thing to real steak to pass through John Jay since the holiday dinner’s awesome filet mignon.

Egged on by the reminders of singledom not-so-tactfully placed on the candy heart
table decorations, which ranged from the impressively modern (“Tweet Me”) to the disturbingly straightforward (“Jump Me”), diners could then move on to the real star of the show: dessert. John Jay truly outdid itself on this count. The chocolate fountain was only the beginning of a near-apocalyptic volume of sweets, including cookies, brownies, cupcakes, crepes, bread pudding, and a full sundae bar.

Questionably romantic

Of course, it’s impossible to consume every option, so the key to taking advantage of John Jay special events is, to put Principles of Econ to full use, maximizing utility by spending one’s calories on what’s truly worth it. As always, that includes the ice cream, a precious commodity typically only available in the watered-down form of gritty, lactose-free yogurt. Load up a scoop of vanilla with fudge and toasted bananas, add a crepe or uber-fudgy brownie to the pile, finish it off with some chocolate-fondue’d strawberries, and leave stuffed and happy.