Your day is busy. You just finished a quiz and you have a project due later this afternoon. You are in a hurry, so you go to the food court and reach for a salad, but everything is different. What are these?!

Gone are items like the roast beef and asparagus on brioche and giant salads. A new line of wraps, salads, light snacks, and microwavable hot foods are now available. 

Examples of the new wraps and sandwiches include a chicken bahn mi, buffalo chicken wrap, turkey club. and portobello pita. The salads, with different-looking greens and packaging, include the mediterranean sampler and quinoa shaker salad. If you are craving a light lunch or a snack, check out the pita and hummus. 

The new items are assembled at an off-site facility, although still made by Sodexo, the multinational corporation running UMass Boston’s dining services and on-campus catering, says General Manager Michael Reilly. The facility is FDA-approved and temperature controlled. Every morning a new batch is made and dropped off on campus. 

Reilly says they moved production to this location because there was no longer enough space in the kitchen to make all the sandwiches. With the more space available now, Sodexo can focus more on the campus catering business. The branding “Dine n’ Dash” on the new cold food is something Sodexo chose.

In addition to the new cold food options, are the microwavable Indian dishes, such as dumplings. These are located next to the sushi and other cold items in the Campus Center Food Court. They are made by the company Cafe Spice, and are also sold at Trader Joe’s.

Reilly says there are a total of 17 new salads and wraps, most of which are regularly available. One slot for each category will feature rotating items. The new offerings are available at all campus dining locations, but smaller sites like the McCormack and Healey Cafe will feature a reduced menu.

“There is only so much space to work with,” says Reilly.

Three cashiers in the Campus Center Food Court confirmed the new items were selling well.

“Students like them. But they complain about the prices,” says one, who also works at the McCormack Cafe. The sandwiches, wraps, and large salads sell for upwards of seven dollars.
One cashier said that students like the new items, because they are “wrapped tight” and ready to be eaten on the go. The portobello pita is a notable exception to this, and may require a fork and knife.