<p>What about people's religious needs? I should not be forced to pay full meal plan price during Ramadan if I am only going to be eating one meal a day, and maybe a snack in the early morning.</p>
<p>yeah, carrera_gt you bring up a good point. i didn't even think about ramadan.</p>
<p>carrera - get the meal plan with the least number of meal blocks and the most dinextra dollars - or whatever they're called. This gives you the most flexibility to be able to fast certain days, and not lose those meal $$ completely. Also understand, the school has to please the MOST people as efficiently as it can, so they will not be able to produce customized meal plans for each student.</p>
<p>Hey guys, I'm trying to decide between 2 Bronze Meal Plans:</p>
<ul>
<li>30 meals + $28Xtra </li>
<li>27 meals + $42Xtra</li>
</ul>
<p>Pros and Cons of each meal? Which one is more flexible?</p>
<p>Thanks,
Angel</p>
<p>Well, what you're doing is trading 3 meals for $14 dineXtra. I believe that the meal block things you get as meals are each worth $6-8, so it's a better to go with the block. The problem, though, is that some of the blocks are very rigid and have massive amounts of food; when I was on campus for sleeping bag weekend, one place had a wrap with some sort of vegetable and meat filling and a side, dessert, and drink as a block. Granted, I wasn't very hungry, but I could barely finish half the wrap and all I had was a wrap and a drink. The dineXtra will give you more flexibility to get what you want not in massive portions; you can spend them on smoothies and stuff too on campus.</p>
<p>I would start by simulating ones own eating habits. For example:
If you eat lunch everyday then take meal plans for lunch: 14 lunches in a meal plan double week.
Youre like me you dont want to eat a whole meal for breakfast and take cereal instead: no meals but instead dinextra dollars
For dinner I like to have flexibility so 50/50, hence 7 meal plans and the rest will be bought with dinextra
The outcome was: 24 meals (rather more then less) and 56$ worth of dinextra.
With this meal plan you have a lot of choice which is what I prefer; other people want the whole meal plan so they never have to think about how much money is left etc...
Good luck with your choice</p>
<p>So DineXtra gives you less value but more flexibility? How much more flexibility? I'm trying to decide between 30 meals, $28 DX and 27 meals, $42 DX, like Angel.</p>
<p>21 BLocks, $70 DineX</p>
<p>Blocks are the devil. You'll soon find this out.</p>
<p>I read the fine print, and you can change it once, so I started out sorta in the middle and will change to 21 blocks, $70 dineX if it's really bad. :)</p>
<p>Oh good. I didn't read the fine print. Maybe I ought to.</p>
<p>You can only change it once and you have to do it at a certain time and stuff, though.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>perfectly said.</p>
<p>Read my "Overview of Carnegie Melon, " which is posted as a sticky post at the top of this forum. I do discuss the food.</p>
<p>Lol. Actually that's a quote from an e-mail my RA sent before I even arrived on campus...</p>
<p>hahaha. that's great</p>
<p>the food made me sick... don't eat from the salad bar, i was throwing up the whole day afterwards, and NO i didn't have a virus....</p>
<p>:( after reading all the posts.........
i have started taking cooking classes from my mother.</p>
<p>Same here, in order to eat healthy i think that the best thing to do. However im very sad that here isnt any decent yoghurt in the US, i dont know how i will live without it :(.</p>
<p>It is a good idea to get some cooking experience, however as a freshman you are REQUIRED to have a meal plan and the smallest plan you can get still has 21 blocks. If you move into an off-campus apartment (ie Fairfax) you can get a commuter plan which had less blocks, but I would strongly recommend the on campus freshman housing if you can get it.</p>