The student-run social media account @hungerhacked shares ways in which students can transform simple ingredients found in the dining hall into their favorite meals from Uptown.
Team members Bethany Ungar, Baylie Pollock, Jonathan Norris, Michale Adams, Sharif Waly and Simon Wang gathered together at Startup Weekend Athens, a Friday-through-Sunday contest where teams gathered to propose business models and create @hungerhacked, a social media account for students to post their creative dining hall food combinations. The group placed first and called themselves the "hunger hackers," Simon Wang, a freshman studying business, said.
The team members first thought of the idea for the social media account when they discussed their own experiences of becoming bored with the dining hall food, Michale Adams, a senior studying specialized studies in business and entrepreneurship, said. Once the hunger hackers established their common opinion, they then had to research to see if other students felt the same way. The team surveyed 60 students and found that about half of them felt the dining halls lacked variety, Wang said.
“At face value, you just see the foods at the dining hall for what they are. You never see the combinations that could be made,” Wang said.
The account, @hungerhacked, can be found on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Students are encouraged to take a picture of their own personal creative dining hall food recipes and share the photo by tagging @hungerhacked, so the team can then repost it. It will repost any food hack that it is tagged in, Adams said. The team has posted a few of its own hacks on the account to set examples for other students. The team has posted hacks to recreate restaurant favorites such as Chipotle Mexican Grill and Bagel Street Deli recipes as well as a hack to make caramel coffee, Adams said.
“It's super easy. You just think of the idea, you make it, and then you just snap a picture of it, and our objective is to have you put the recipe in the description, so other students can make it as well,” Adams said.
Joan Merise, an undecided freshman, has even put a name to her own Nelson Court creation. Merise makes the pasta dish "Vicious and Delicious" by first going to the Kalamata Leaf line and putting jalapeno dip underneath rigatoni pasta. She then puts alfredo and a little bit of meat sauce on top of the pasta. After this, she puts a generous amount of Italian seasoning and red pepper flakes on top. She then goes to the salad bar where she puts shredded cheese, bacon, shredded beef and ham on top. She finally finishes the recipe with salt and pepper.
“It’s really good, but yet it has a kick to it because you add pepper and the red pepper flakes,” Merise said. “I like the kick because I grew up in a family where we use spices all the time. Plus the jalapeno dip gives it another punch, too.”
By sharing food creations on @hungerhacked, students may feel more inspired by their dining hall resources rather than discouraged by them.
“Students can feel a little bit overwhelmed going into the dining hall, especially freshmen for the first time,” Adams said. “So being able to give them and anyone ideas on how they can better enjoy their experience and better utilize their money (is great).”
