Cooking Facilities

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - Berkeley
1

<p>This obviously applies almost exclusively to on-campus housing, given that I doubt there's such thing as an apartment in which one is legally prevented from cooking.</p>

<p>Anyway, I've stayed in one dorm at the Clark Kerr campus for a summer program. It was a suite, with two 2-person bedrooms, a bathroom, and a kitchen. Thing is, I knew a number of people staying in less-fancy dorms who had to share bathrooms and so forth. The topic of kitchens never came up, though, so:</p>

<p>1) Are the rooms in general outfitted with some kind of oven (even a mini-convection oven; I'm specifically excluding microwaves here, because I hate using them)?</p>

<p>2) If not, is there any policy preventing you from just bringing one into your room and using it?</p>

<p>3) Failing that, do the dorm buildings not containing suites have any kind of common room with cooking facilities?</p>

<p>4) Are small refrigerators/freezers allowed in those dorm rooms not already outfitted with them?</p>

<p>Thanks in advance!</p>

2

<p>hahahahaha. rooms with a mini-convection oven????? i wish. you can rent a refrigerator and a microwave for like $210 per year. The fridge has a real freezer, which is nice. you are legally not allowed to bring anything in, but i know lots of people who have water boilers, rice cookers, and other contraband. and if you want a full-equipped kitchen, there's one downstairs on the ground floor (this is for unit 1 only, i don't know anything about the others)</p>

3

<p>If bringing a refrigerator/microwave/other is contraband, then Davidson (Unit 2) has more banned items than Burning Man. I highly, highly, highly doubt outside appliances are banned, and if for some moronic reason they are, then no one cares at all. Just about every single room I've seen has at least a minifridge (most not rented), and plenty have have rice cookers, etc. Personally, I have a fridge/freezer, microwave, and blender, and I've used each one plenty thus far.</p>

<p>To answer jonnosferatu's original questions:</p>

<p>1) It depends on the room style. The older buildings in the Units have a central kitchen on the ground floor with an oven, ice machine, sink, and vending machines for general use. Other than that, it's up to you. If you hate microwaves, you can definitely bring up some kind of compact toaster oven, so long as you won't burn down your building or set off the fire alarm and make everyone in your building hate you.</p>

<p>2) Maybe, but I've never seen or heard of it being enforced. If you're not destroying any property or clearly threatening anything...no one cares.</p>

<p>3) I guess I answered this for the Units, but there's a lot of different dorm styles, so it does really depend. Residential</a> and Student Service Programs, UC Berkeley can help a lot if you have any basic questions.</p>

<p>4) Definitely not in the Units. If/when you want to get these, don't rent tem. Cal makes a pretty penny off renting fridges and microwaves for way more than it cost to actually purchase. Just go to Walmart, Target, Costco, etc. and pick one up for less than renting.</p>

<p>5) Yes, you should share with your floormates if you're at all a decent cook. Getting creative with food borrowed from the dining halls gets you major brownie points and saves cash/points as well.</p>

4

<p>Thanks for the help!</p>

5

<p>Don't plan on cooking much, if at all. Dorm fridges are too small to hold a significant amount of food, and the freezer compartments are never at -20C, so meat products will spoil a lot faster. You can buy portable, plug-in burners, but they're weaker than their stovetop counterparts. It's also a pain to wash dishes in a lot of the dorms. Lastly, you'll have to consider the issue of smells, since most rooms don't have good ventilation.</p>

<p>There are small, basic kitchens in some of the dorms, but in general, cooking is not at all convenient in this context.</p>

<p>If you are trying to save money, bring tupperware into the DCs and store food, or stash extra in their take-out.</p>