Must-have foods for a stressed college student

So far this semester, I have yet to take a single exam or midterm. Instead, I have been taking a few quizzes here and there and writing a couple short papers. Then this week all my teachers announced tests for the following week. The stress started to set in.  And what is my awful habit when I’m stressed? I eat. A lot. So as I head home for the weekend, I started to think about what food my dorm room is lacking to help me relieve some of that stress.

1. Tea

With the weather getting rainy and a little colder and with sickness spreading around the campus, tea is the absolutely perfect fix. I find that reading while drinking a hot cup of tea is very relaxing and usually makes reading a boring textbook a little bit easier. Plus with so many different flavors of tea, I have so many options; right now, chamomile and chai tea are my favorite flavors.

2. Easy Mac

This is the perfect comfort food for those stressful days, and it takes less than four minutes to make in your microwave. So when I’m stressed and hungry but don’t want to take too long of a break or walk too far, mixing up a package of easy mac is super easy and tastes really good. It makes me think of home and the days when homework wasn’t all that was on my mind…

3. Cereal

I’ve never been a huge fan of milk, or cereal in fact, but if I’m up studying and plan to be studying for a while, a bowl of cereal has become the perfect midnight snack. There are so many different types of cereals to choose from, and eating some of my favorites as a kid (Cap’n Crunch, Trix, Honey Bunches of Oats, Frosted Flakes) makes me feel less stressed as I remember the good memories and easier days of being in elementary school.

4. Peanut Butter

One of my favorite things to eat is peanut butter; I like it on things like sandwiches, eating it with bananas or on crackers or just eating it plain. And the good thing about peanut butter is that a little bit goes a long way, which helps when all I want to do is stress-eat! It’s very filling, and depending on the type and brand you get, relatively good for you. Plus peanut butter just tastes good.

5. Dark Chocolate

My weakness in life is definitely chocolate. I can go through so much of it in a day, but obviously that is super unhealthy and definitely adds a lot of calories to your diet (which doesn’t help with the whole freshman 15 thing). So what I have found is that keeping some dark chocolate in my room satisfies my need, or craving, for something sweet but isn’t an overload of sugar, like with milk chocolate. Plus dark chocolate has been shown to be good for your heart, brain, and has tons of antioxidants (things I don’t really look for when getting chocolate, but an added benefit nonetheless).