There are five all-you-care-to-eat dining halls on IU’s campus: Collins, Forest Quad, Goodbody Hall, McNutt Quad and Wright Quad. Each location hosts micro-restaurants offering a variety of cuisines spanning from pizza and burgers to international food and dessert options.
While there are vegan and vegetarian options at each location, some have a wider variety of options for those with dietary restrictions and preferences. Wright Quad dining hall offers a Free From IX micro-restaurant. Free From IX locations feature food prepared without the nine proteins that can trigger allergic reactions — egg, fish, milk, peanut, sesame, soy, wheat, tree nuts and shellfish.
McNutt Dining Hall also offers several vegan, vegetarian and Free From IX items. Menus can be found on IU Dining’s website.
According to IU Dining’s website, IU Dining staff, including student staff, are trained on allergens and food preparation. The chef and manager at each location are available to answer questions and can prepare foods using allergen-free equipment.
Cross-contact occurs when an allergen is transferred from a food containing the allergen to a food that does not contain it. Cross-contact can be a risk in situations where students may serve themselves, such as buffets. If a student is concerned about cross-contact, IU Dining encourages students to ask a staff member to wash their hands and change gloves, use a clean utensil to serve their meal, serve their food from the kitchen rather than the serving line and to give them an overview of the day’s fryer items.
Students can schedule an appointment to meet with an IU registered dietitian by emailing nutrinfo@indiana.edu. Registered dietitians can help them create a personal plan based on their dietary needs and put them in contact with dining managers and chefs at the dining locations closest to their campus housing location.
While navigating menu items in crowded dining halls can be difficult, students can look ahead using IU Dining’s NetNutrition tool. NetNutrition allows students to choose the dining location closest to them and select foods they’re allergic to. The tool will display menu items that suit the student’s needs. NetNutrition also offers ingredient lists.
To help students know which foods to avoid, IU also uses icons representing 12 common types of allergies. If students have an allergy, they can look for the icons on NetNutrition, menus and linecards.
Here are the types of allergies:
B: Beef
C: Coconut
D: Dairy
E: Eggs
F: Fish
G: Gluten
P: Peanuts
PK: Pork
SE: Sesame
SF: Shellfish
S: Soy
TN: Tree Nuts
Some students may limit or eliminate certain food items from their diets due to dietary intolerances or religious or ethical beliefs.
There are a variety of vegetarian options at each dining location. While menus rotate daily, common items such as salads, soymilk, fresh fruit and hummus are offered daily. Students can identify vegetarian items by looking for the “VG” symbol on NetNutrition, menus and linecards.
Students following plant-based or vegan diets can find options at IU’s all-you-care-to-eat dining halls. Vegan items can be identified by a “V" symbol.
Free From IX locations offer halal meat. During Ramadan, these locations offer suhoor and iftar carry-out refrigerated meals to reheat. These are available upon request.
While IU does not have a certified kosher kitchen, kosher items are available in campus stores.
