Fresher’s Fourteen (noun): The amount of weight, in pounds, that the average fresher gains within their first term at university.
For most students, going to university is the first time they will be fending for themselves in the kitchen. This is daunting at best; for many, this prospect is downright terrifyingly alien. So, meals where you really can’t go wrong become a daily staple. Chicken nuggets and chips, anyone?
But, it doesn’t have to be this way! Follow these handy tips, and hopefully you’ll still fit into your jeans by reading week.
1. Eating cheap doesn’t necessarily mean microwave pizza
Know what’s cheap? Vegetables are cheap. Find the veg aisle in Tesco, buy a wok, and become king of the stir fry. By not letting yourself get into the mindset of “I am a student now, therefore I have no money, therefore I must eat garbage”, you can save yourself a lot of woe. And a whole lot of indigestion.
2. Pasta expands a lot when you cook it
Learn this now, and never look back. Too many times during first year will you tip what looks like a good amount of pasta into the pan, only to come back ten minutes later to find that you have made enough to last about a week. And, of course, being students, you feel obliged to eat it. The back of the packet is usually helpful when it comes to portion sizings; play this up or down, depending on whether you are a rugby boy or a cheerleader.
3. You don’t have to have chips with everything
Tempting as it may be to rebel against 18 years of your mother’s desperate attempts to stop you eating so many chips, if you get to the stage when you can’t remember the last meal you ate that didn’t come with a side serving of oven fries, maybe it’s time to reconsider your life choices.
On a side-note, waffles are just chips in disguise.
4. Accept that you will probably get food poisoning at some point
It’s an undeniable fact that learning to cook for yourself isn’t easy. So many mistakes are there to be made: things will be burnt, things will boil over, microwaves will explode, and meat will, inevitably, be undercooked. The only way to learn from this mistake is to make it. Food poisoning is grim, but, like going through puberty, it’s just a part of growing up. Yes you might be scared of it, but once it’s done, you won’t be making the same mistake again. Giving yourself food poisoning is one reason why so many students are afraid of the kitchen, but really, it’s not going to kill you.
As a general rule, however, pink chicken is not your friend.
5. Actually do some exercise
Unless you join a sports team on day one, it’s very easy to fall into the trap of letting the only exercise you get be when you hit the dancefloor on a night out.
So what if you’re not a gym bunny? Gyms can be a daunting place, and if you haven’t got anyone to go with, it’s really hard to muster up the motivation. But people often forget that just walking places is really helpful. Try walking to campus instead of getting the bus; take on the hills that your university town almost certainly has; walk your shopping home from Tesco instead of getting it delivered (this has the added benefit of forcing you to shop carefully- non essential items like cake take up too much room in the bag). Or on your days off, why not make the effort to get out of your halls and actually take a wander around this city that you’ve moved to?
New students often see staying healthy at university as an impossible task. But if you break out of this stereotype, and don’t let things scare you, now is the time that you can really learn what it is like to be an adult… And isn’t that what university is all about?
Failing that, you can always do what I did, and phone your mum in tears because you can’t remember how to make gravy.
Do you have any more tips for maintaining a healthy lifestyle at university? Let us know in the comments below!
Photo: Alan Cleaver / Flickr
English Literature at Exeter. Online Features Editor, Exeposé. Enjoys a decent mojito, and plays netball, badly.
Also a little obsessed with Virginia Woolf.
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