Food at The Universe

The Universe operates somewhat like a co-op when it comes to food. Most camp members bring food to share with others, and we have volunteer shifts to cook a dinner for the whole camp every night (and clean up afterwards!). We don't charge dues to participate in the camp food plan, which works out if most camp members contribute. If you are excited about cooking dinner but are concerned about the cost or logistics involved, please reach out to the camp leadership and we will assist.

For each event, we look for volunteers to sign up to plan and cook a dinner every night (sometimes excluding early arrival or the first day of the event). We want at least two people to sign up to cook, and two to clean – usually, one person is the “big cook” and handles planning the meal, and the other “little cook” helps out with preparation, etc., but this is up to the people who sign up. We also want two people to sign up to clean up after the meal – this means the cooking and preparation dishes only; we expect camp members to clean their own eating dishes. Splitting it up this way means that the cooks get to relax after serving dinner. Volunteering for one of these slots will only take an hour or two of the event, and is a great way to contribute to the camp.

While most cooks will try to accommodate allergies and dietary preferences, there is no guarantee they will. We ask cooks to list their planned meal and relevant allergens on the Camp Meals tab in the spreadsheet. If you aren't sure if a certain meal will work for you, feel free to contact the big cook directly!

Additionally, our camp does not guarantee allergen-free surfaces, or surfaces that are 100% free of, for example, animal products. If you have very specific needs regarding cooking surfaces, please plan to bring whatever cooking equipment you need.

If you are still unsure, about whether a meal or cooking surface will work for you, please bring a back up meal for the meals that may cause an issue.

Dinner cooks are encouraged to prepare food ahead of time if it makes sense, whether that means making a whole chili ahead of time and freezing it, or just doing some initial preparation of vegetables to make things quicker in the woods. While we do generally have enough kitchen supplies to get things done, there is limited space, so thinking about what you can do at home before the event to save time is worth it. Ask the mailing list if you have a recipe idea but aren't sure how to make it happen in the woods! Meals should be prepared for something like 50-75% of the number of people in the camp at a given event, because it is normal for some fraction of the camp to not be hungry at dinnertime, want to prepare their own food, or otherwise not end up eating the camp dinner. Aiming for less than 100% is a way to help avoid excessive food waste, since we almost always end up having leftovers that we try to give away to people outside the camp. Please also make sure to bring any special equipment you might need for your meal unless you already know that someone else in the camp will be bringing it.

Dinner is served at 18:00, which is also when the daily camp meeting starts. Cooks should plan accordingly, meaning that the kitchen normally is taken over for dinner preparation at around 16:00-16:30. Other camp members should be respectful of the camp cooks, and try to avoid getting in the way of dinner preparations if possible. Cleaners should be ready to start cleaning by 19:00 at the latest, and ideally should start right after the camp meeting, so that food doesn't sit around and get stuck on dishes. It's also sometimes possible to cleaners to clean dishes while the cooks are working.

Food that is brought for camp dinners should be in containers or bags if possible, and should be labeled with the date of use (e.g. “Friday Dinner”). This means that we know when things are up for grabs, since sometimes ingredients are left over after cooking and can be used for other purposes or given away. There is a designated area in the kitchen for storing camp dinner ingredients – look for the sign when you arrive.

We have a number of coolers that are used for storing dinner and communal foods. There is a chance you will be able to fit your food in one of the coolers, but it is not guaranteed! If you need your food to be in a cooler to stay fresh, you should plan on either bringing your own cooler, or coordinating ahead of time to make sure you have space reserved in another cooler.

Everyone is encouraged to bring food to share with the camp. Since dinners are taken care of, this usually means breakfast, lunch, and snack foods. Please use the camp event spreadsheet to let others know what you plan to bring, so that we don't get a ton of duplicates.

Things that are good to bring:

• Fruit
• Nuts and trail mix (be mindful of allergies!)
• Carbs
• Breakfast foods (eggs, pancake mix, meats, oatmeal, etc)
• Energy bars and other quick snacks
• Chips, hummus, salsa, etc
• Yogurt

Things that are not ideal to bring (to share – if you know you'll eat these things personally, go ahead and bring them):

• Canned goods
• Lots of dinner food you don't plan on eating

You can also opt out of sharing food with the rest of camp, and bring whatever you need to be self-sufficient. In that case, you should plan on either keeping your food with your personal campsite, or labeling it well with your name so that people don't accidentally eat your food.

We expect every camp member to be responsible for their own water, whether that means bringing it personally or arranging for someone else to bring it. However, once we get set up in camp, we generally treat the water supply like a shared resource, and pull from everyone's water supply to keep public drinking water available. For Firefly and NECTR, we get dishwashing water from the streams, and dispose of grey water on-site.

We do not officially have a bar, but those who enjoy alcohol often bring it to share. We will have a location where people can put alcohol that they are fine with others drinking. If you want to bring something fancy and not have it unexpectedly disappear, you should probably keep it in your tent.

We expect everyone to pack out their share of trash, and to bring home any leftover food that they brought. If you don't want to bring home leftovers, there are some fun ways you can give away extra food to other participants! We often do some kind of public food giveaway towards the end of the event.