Disappointed with the variety of John Jay already? The lines for ‘good’ food in Ferris too long? Or are you just craving a taste of Italian food but spent too much on your meal plan to afford real Italian food? In this special edition of Cooking with Bwog, a first-year staffer  shows you how to make something resembling a meal, with those same John Jay items you already find so dull.

Let Bwog show you how to take your first steps into the inevitable aspirational pretension that will define your time here by teaching you how to make your own bruschetta! And better yet: all the ingredients you need can be found in John Jay Dining Hall.

Ingredients

• Two slices of whatever bread is lying about
• Cherry tomatoes from the salad bar
• Garlic/standard salt (John Jay doesn’t clearly label the salt because it recognizes that as a Columbia student, you have transcended the need for labels)
• Cracked pepper
• Basil-infused olive oil
• A shake of vinegar

Directions

1. Cut two thick slices of bread onto a plate and place a large handful of cherry tomatoes in a bowl.
2. Proceed to the conveyor-belt toaster in the back corner of John Jay and toast the bread. Consider skipping this step. Realize that there is really no knowing how long the bread in your hands has sat in that secluded little corner of John Jay. Toast the bread.
3. As the bread toasts, cut the cherry tomatoes in half so that they look vaguely like real tomato slices if you squint hard enough. Ina Garten would be ashamed.
4. Carry the toasted bread and tomatoes to the spice rack over by the dessert aisle. Season with salt (with or without garlic) and pepper to preference, apply a small dousing of vinegar, and sprinkle tomatoes with basil-infused olive oil.
5. After mixing the halved tomatoes and seasoning in the bowl, scoop equal portions onto each slice of bread.
6. Behold your monument to glorious ambition/stubborn clinging to humanity (depending on your post-NSOP high)
7. Poke it with a fork.
8. (optional) Eat your creation, or just go back to the buffet line and stuff yourself on pasta for your Italian fix.