I’m not vegan, but I looked toward vegan food options on campus after I noticed how unhealthy most of everything else was. My personal favourite was introduced to me by friend and fellow writer License2Derive back in my first year of undergrad. FRSH, the vegetarian/vegan establishment with salad bowls (and many more hot bowls, and many more flatbreads), blessed me with more options than I could ever try in my lifetime.
Rather, FRSH blessed me for 3.5 school terms before COVID attacked. When I returned to campus a subjective decade later, I waited excitedly for the reopening of FRSH. But as other establishments across campus slowly came back, FRSH never returned.
If you visit the EXP building today, you’ll see a metal security grill in the corner next to Starbucks, closing off the window to FRSH. On the pillar nearby, two frames hold yellowing menus. $8.99 for a salad bowl, $9.99 for a hot bowl. The prices are unheard of in our inflated world today. Heck, even back then, FRSH had some of the best value on campus!
Above the security grill is a sign in the colours of the Faculty of Health. In stylized lowercase letters, it reads FRSH. Smaller letters underneath say the names of the conjoined twin buildings that the establishment is located in: AHS and BMH.
Those who have been around for a while will remember AHS as the old name of the EXP building, which the university renamed sometime last year. Alarmingly, the sign never got the update. So I think it is safe to say that FRSH will not be coming back anytime soon, if at all. Since it opened in September 2018, FRSH has spent more than half that time closed. Even when it was open, I could kind of see the end coming. Part of my love for FRSH was that there was never a line longer than two people. And the incredible value they served to the trickle of customers obviously wasn’t making the university much money.
But that doesn’t mean FRSH was bad! Its ingredients tasted fresher than the mass-produced vegetable shreds they serve in the SLC. Far removed from the pressure-cooker stress of the SLC lunch rush, the staff were friendlier and more patient, too. FRSH’s dressings and roasted ingredients gave its salads actual personality, unlike the cold, dry knockoffs served at Ev3rgreen Café. The lines at Rolltation are ridiculously long, and their sushi burritos shatter into a hundred pieces at the first bite. Calling those impostors vegan is like calling McDonalds vegan. They might make things vegan if you ask, but that is not the default. Only FRSH had that, and FRSH did it excellently.
Speaking of Rolltation, I am also old enough to remember what used to be there before. In that very spot, the previous DC Bytes had a location serving hot Chinese food. You could mix and match a platter full to the brim with rice or noodles, bok choy or stir fry veggies, and various proteins, including vegetarian/vegan options. Again, the value was amazing, and you barely had to wait for your food. By my standards, that might’ve been the second best vegan place on campus.
In summer 2019, the university renovated DC Bytes. The old restaurants were torn out, to be replaced with the ones we recognize today, like Rolltation. The lines bleeding out into the hallway give the new gentrified DC Bytes an illusion of quality, but I suspect it’s just because the food takes longer to make now.
If the university chooses to renovate the shell of FRSH, I hope they do better than that. Or they can make their lives easier and just bring FRSH back. After all, it’s hard to fill the shoes of the best vegan place on campus.