Best Press Box Food For College Football In the Nation?

Spread in the Baylor box not as good today: Salad fixings, hot dogs swimming in some sort of liquid with chili and cheese available, and fatty brisket. The Blue Bell ice cream afterwards was good, but not nearly as good as the Katie's Custard from the past several years.

 

You want to do a story on food at athletic events, then do one on small town prep basketball tournament hospitality fare. The folks at these tournaments go to great lengths and at their own expense to provide food for the tournament workers and media. The food at these tournaments is usually off the charts, especially the various venison chili, stews, etc. And the desserts are usually homemade pies and cakes that are fantastic. There are probably 2-3 elderly ladies who've been doing this for years and would make a great feature story. Far better than some catered college buffet.

 

Ohio State is solid. They have brisket sandwiches with slaw and/or potato salad, the normal dogs and such...but the best are the McDonalds iced coffe and Oreo McFlurries they provide.

By the way, the best meal I remember was chicken-sausage gumbo at Pitt Stadium in the early 1990's. Fantastic.

 

Tonight at Baylor: Really good fajitas, but the buffet line was out of order (toppings, then meat then the tortillas). On the plus side, the tortillas were freshly-grilled. Chili dogs were also available. Cookies and chocolate-coconut bars were available at the half. Blue Bell ice cream and unlimited Dr Pepper products were again available.

 

Covered a game at Maryland today. Press box "buffet" was $15. It was cold cuts, bread, chips, cookies. I don't mind paying, but that's ridiculous. Georgia Tech cost $5 earlier this year and it was BBQ sandwiches and chicken fingers and sides.
Luckily Maryland warned us this week via email... me and another hack just stopped at the concession stand before we went to the press box. Got a good cheeseburger and hot dog for $9.75.
The fact that I spent $5 less at the concession stand for better, more substantive food is a joke.

 

Blasphemy!

Seriously, are there better places that are cheaper? Sure. But I think everyone needs to go once to judge for themselves.
As for me, I hope to have The Rendezvous' dry ribs as my last meal if I'm so lucky.

 

Shelley did that? Darn it, I knew I should have gone there when they played Snake River earlier this year.

 

I do mind paying, and I refuse to pay for a school-provided meal. It's absolute bull that they want to charge for that when we're doing our job based on their time schedule. They shouldn't be making money on us doing our job. That's totally wrong. They should either not provide food at all, or it should be free.

As for the question, Iowa State's buttermilk brownies were just amazing. I'm of the opinion that if the Cyclones start handing them out to recruits, Oklahoma and Texas' days of dominating the Big 12 are finished. Those brownies are that good.

The best overall was either Nebraska or Iowa State. Nebraska's meat and potatoes with pizza afterwards is great, and Iowa State's pork tenderloin with chili bowls and hot dogs were also excellent. Best postseason event food was the Big 12 title game, which had four kinds of cheesecake. Worst was Missouri, who just didn't have a good spread at all. The potatoes were fine, but the rest was really weak. I've heard that nobody is buying their pregame meal now that they're charging. Worst postseason was probably El Paso. Their Tex-Mex just wasn't that good. That's a town I'd like to never visit again.

 

I don't know if that's entirely the right approach, because they don't have to feed any of us.

But I'm not a fan of paying for food if only because that money typically goes to the university, or if not the university, then a vendor that supports the university. It's a tiny thing, but that's a principle in my book and personally, I'm not fond of crossing that line.

That means you, Madison Square Garden.

 

Well, if they don't want to feed us at all, fine by me. But they shouldn't be trying to profit off of us. Either no food, or free food.

 

When I was at MSG covering the NIT Final 4, the proceeds from the press meal went to an MSG children's charity. I didn't have that big of an issue with it.

 

That'd be okay if it went to charity. That's the only way I'd pay.