On a recent Friday night, Dantes Martinez abandoned his typical convenience meals and went to the store in search of something different. 

“I’ve had a long week,” he said. “I want a taste of home.” His choice: his mother’s rice and beans with stew chicken, the national Belizean dish. When Martinez lived at home, his mother would assist in the cooking process. But now, making the meal taste authentic is more of a challenge.

He made a last-minute run to the organic, overpriced grocery store — the only place within walking distance that sold the ingredients for his mother’s dish — and then returned home, his arms full of plantains and green peppers.

The recipe book Dantes Martinez’s mother made him on Nov. 8, 2024.

Born to a Peruvian mother and Belizean father, Martinez knows his way around the world, but not so much around his mother’s makeshift recipe book. The composition notebook is filled with neatly written instructions for meals Martinez requested his mother add when she sent him off to college.

At the University of Texas at Austin, 10% of the student population is out of state, with almost the same percentage of international students. UT represents all 50 states and 130 countries. These statistics do not account for the individuals who lived in various states or countries throughout their lifetime. With a white population only taking up one-third of campus, there is a rich multicultural presence. This might seem to get lost in the cracks when looking at demographics on a macro-level, but there are over 50,000 people, including graduate students, attending the university as of today. This means even seemingly small percentages reflect a sizable amount. To embrace this diversity, there are currently 30 culture and region-focused student organizations and events throughout the year.

However, just because community is available at public universities like UT Austin, certain cultural experiences are not accessible unless students organize them. Namely, food. Substantial nutrition is a struggle especially as living in Austin gets more expensive. In West Campus, the designated off-campus neighborhood for UT students, residents lack adequate affordable options for nutrient-rich food, and nearly half of students at the school experience food insecurity. When getting three meals a day is hard enough, imagine trying to recreate the meals you grew up with, especially when they require ingredients not found in the average grocery store. Though not all cuisines are hard to make or require foods uncommon in American supermarkets, there is also the added barrier of limited time and the prioritization of convenience food for young adults who happen to be full-time students. There is a lack of confidence in cooking abilities and a lack of willingness to spend the time to make a home-cooked meal.

Martinez expanded on this, saying it took planning for him to make even a relatively simple meal like rice and beans. “When it comes to cooking things, it’s like well, I could make this or I could just make a quesadilla.” He said, laughing. “Obviously I want to make more interesting and better tasting foods, but life doesn’t necessarily want me to.” Though he expressed the idea lightheartedly, this reflects a struggle many students face while in college. 

“I remember the first time I was making the rice and beans I was calling my mom the entire time, like, ‘Am I doing it right? Am I doing it right?’” he said. 

Martinez spent the first years of his life in Belize before moving to Houston. His mother did most of the cooking, learning how to prepare Belizean cuisine in addition to her native Peruvian. Martinez grew up helping her, especially with tedious tasks like chopping vegetables. 

This is the first year that Martinez is preparing and eating food alone. Now in his third year at UT Austin, he adjusted from family dinners to dining halls to cooperative living spaces — and, most recently, to apartment life. The latter is much more lonely, he notices. Though he is grateful to be out of the hectic co-op life, Martinez misses preparing and sharing meals with others. When he makes rice and beans this time, the house is silent.

Martinez meticulously lays out the ingredients and begins. The first step is to marinate the chicken with a crushed chicken bouillon cube that ends up all over his hands, lime juice, red pepper flakes and Recado seasoning – the key spice blend in Belizean cuisine and some regions of Mexico. After working the mixture into the meat, he rhythmically dices vegetables with a chop, chop, chop on the wooden cutting board that reverberates through the open floor plan.

Dantes Martinez eats rice and beans with stewed chicken, following his mother’s recipe, in Austin, Texas on Nov. 8, 2024.

While the spices amalgamate, he shifts his attention to the white rice and Goya black beans, though it's the flavor, not the type of bean, that matters. Into the saute pan goes Thai Kitchen coconut milk, and a heavy hand of bouillon and Recado.

He brings the mixture to a boil, and then cuts the heat, reducing the dish to a simmer. Dantes primes a second pan with oil. Hungry and impatient after only eating one meal that day, he tosses in the chicken and vegetables a bit prematurely. They stew on the stove until Dantes discerns the pinkness of the chicken is from the seasonings and not rawness. 

He paces the kitchen back and forth, taking small bites of the rice and beans once they are off the burner. Martinez fries up plantains on the stove, but the quick char comes at the cost of losing their firm texture. The heat was too high, he concludes. 

The meal is plated and good enough. “Home cooked food is not really something you get in college, and trying to make your own home cooked food is not the same.”

Martinez tries a few bites, pauses to send a picture to his parents, then resumes. Making his mother’s recipes are trial-and-error, but they taste better every time.

Norah De Zwart is one of the students counting the days until she can go home for break. Growing up in the states but visiting the Netherlands yearly at Christmas, she is as much Dutch as she is American. Not only was she born abroad, but all of her relatives outside her immediate family still live there. Though most of her time is spent in America, she said “it feels almost so natural to be back that to describe it as anything differently than being at home would be false.” 

Dutch food is not something she makes often, but she adapted the classic aardappels, vlees, groente (potatoes, meat, vegetables) base to most of her meals. De Zwart loves to eat Gouda cheese for breakfast and open-faced sandwiches known as uitsmijter. 

She always has her stroopwafels (thin cookies sandwiched with caramel) with tea, resting them on the rim of the cup to let the steam melt the syrupy center. And, she prefers Zaanse halfvolle mayo to Heinz. Shaorma, the Dutch spelling of Shawarma, and Speculaas, reminiscent of chai spices, are easily accessible in her spice cabinet. Still, De Zwart clarifies that there is not inherently a “Dutch” way to eat food, and that many components she identifies with are found in other cultures. Plus, with a Turkish mother and an American upbringing, food did not always look traditional. When it comes to its influence in her current diet, De Zwart says Dutch food is “in the periphery as opposed to the center.” She rarely makes traditional foods but is constantly pulling from ingredients unavailable in the States that she and her family acquire every time they visit the Netherlands.

Norah De Zwart prepares ontbijtkoek, a traditional Dutch recipe, in Austin, Texas on Nov. 17, 2024.

As the year winds down and Christmas flavors come back in season, De Zwart makes ontbijtkoek, breakfast cake, for the second time this semester. She uses Speculaas, the same spice blend as Biscoff cookies, and follows a recipe her mother found that she copied into her notes app. The finished product is warm, delicious and slightly raw in the middle even days later. It is imperfect and not exactly a replica of what she is used to, but she enjoys it nonetheless. The inability to bake an identical copy is not entirely a problem, but depending on how great the shortcoming, it can be frustrating. Martinez commented on this, saying that “if I screw up, it’s like I was looking forward to having this meal that’s sort of a home and then ‘oh! I messed up,’ I don’t get the same experience.” There was a large adjustment for him with becoming the primary cook in the kitchen. Now he faces less disappointment.

Angelica Ruzanova, “a Russian from Uzbekistan” and current UT student, cannot always remember the ingredients or what their names are. Coming from a multicultural background can mean struggling to embrace all aspects of her identity equally. For Ruzanova, who also happened to be a picky eater growing up, her diet varied geographically. Now the kitchen she shares with her sister Evelina Ruzanova, an ACC student, is stocked with a plethora of goods from the Borderless European Market, but even so, what she and her sister want is not always in stock. They go often because they love the food, but for people like Martinez, who doesn't have a car, visiting specialized grocery stores is harder.

Cooperative housing is one place that does mealtimes differently. Due to the nature of requiring labor for cheaper rent and to foster a collaborative environment, home-cooking thrives. Moving to college does not have to get replaced with preparing or eating food in solitude. Not every housemate cooks, but most of them eat, and they do so together at the dining table when schedules align. Part of the nostalgic quality of food is taste, but it can also be the act of sharing a meal and talking about the day. Further, there is a large international student draw to the spaces because of the greater affordability and access to community. At Helios Co-op, all residents have the chance to send in recipes and at House of Commons, the chefs purposefully pick recipes from across the world. Others have international nights. Even for students unable or unwilling to cook, there is the opportunity to get a taste of home. Some of the clubs host cultural events with food, and in Austin there are over 4,000 restaurants encompassing flavors from nearly every continent. For students on a budget, international food might be right under their noses. 

In a cooperative living arrangement seven streets over from Martinez’s, another university student toils away in a larger-scale kitchen. Food is served with company and conversation in the warmly lit dining area. The meals are not always authentic, but the collaborative effort is reminiscent of helping parents in the kitchen. 

Leila Saidane and Kaitlyn Marshall prepare dinner for the residents at Helios Co-op in Austin, Texas on Oct. 27, 2024.

Every Sunday at 5 p.m. at Helios Co-op, a historic yellow house owned and operated by ICC Austin, Leila Saidane and Kaitlyn Marshall get to work in the kitchen. This week, pasta and Marshall’s mother’s strawberry shortcake are on the menu. Marshall chops onions while Saidane dices the chicken. Two packages of penne boil in a restaurant-sized pot on the stove by the corner. Saidane spreads the pieces onto a baking sheet, mixing them with a conglomeration of this-and-that spices. They go into the oven to bake.

Saidane takes intermittent breaks by the rack of mugs, sitting on a lone barstool as she tinkers with the poster design for their upcoming “Helioween” party. Housemates pass in and out for drinks, snacks and a quick chat. Marshall multitasks between tending to the aromatics she just placed in a pan next to the noodles and preparing the biscuit dough for dessert. Housemates Sifur and Ada stand between Leila and the preparation area, with the house cat, Chai, perched on Sifur’s shoulder. The strawberries get sliced and dashed with sugar, biscuits bake in the oven.  

Draining the pasta water is a two person job. Saidane hops off the stool, colander in hand as Marshall brings the freshly boiled noodles over in a comically large pot, still not enough to feed the 17 people who live there, they realize. Marshall pours the penne into the colander and after a quick shake, Leila tips the noodles back in. Together they stir in the sun dried tomatoes, parmesan, onion sauce mixture seasoned with nearly everything from the spice rack. Bowtie noodles, the only type left on hand, boil on the stove at the last minute, “just in case.” The chicken and biscuits wait ready on their respective serving trays. 

Now degrees warmer, the kitchen smells richly of cumin, oregano and whipping cream as Marshall tries, and fails, to make the shortcake topping. “I didn’t know you could over whip it!” she exclaims. Using the last of the heavy cream she tries again – a success. With the meal finally ready after two hours of cooking, they place the food onto the serving table in the dining room. Saidane runs back to drop the dishes and utensils into the utility sink and then places the silverware tray next to the meal. 

Sundried tomato pasta is served for dinner at Helios Co-op in Austin, Texas on Oct. 27, 2024.

Inside the dining room is a long table with bench seats long enough for a dozen people, the perimeter lined with occupied chairs and couches and an out-of-tune piano. Sundays are also house meeting nights. With the majority of residents downstairs helping themselves to the food,  the meal is joined by a discussion of house responsibilities. At this moment, they are not roommates but representatives of different functions within the household. The formalities are interspersed with gossip, compliments to the chef, and musings about Halloween costumes. Saidane asks her roommates which of her poster designs they prefer. The seriousness eventually drops away, and a different set of people make their way into the kitchen for cleanup.

Many university students leave family dinner traditions behind after moving into college. Cooperative living, however, offers residents a different approach to young adult independence. House dinners are a regular occurrence. As a part of their labor contract, small groups of residents prepare the meals together for everyone else. Though not everyone eats, at least at the same time, the process of preparation and sharing a meal helps to bond housemates in places that have anywhere from a dozen to over 100 residents.

Though Angelica may only share her living space with her sister Evelina, hospitality is ingrained in her. The siblings often offer snacks to their friends to try, but the goods are not always well-received. Especially when it comes to qurt, a dry fermented cheese snack, nobody likes it quite so much as Evelina. Tea, and the specific approach to pouring, is something especially prized. With anything requiring dishes, “presenting food is as important as how it tastes,” Angelica said. Food is not the main way she retains her culture; she leaves that to language, literature, history, music and inside jokes with her sister. However, she notes that she has many memories of food that tie to milestones in her life.

Angelica Ruzanova demonstrates how to pour a cup of tea in Austin, Texas on Nov. 13, 2024 with leaves she purchased from her last visit to Uzbekistan.

The Ruzanova family moved around a lot while Angelica and Evelina were growing up, but Angelica identifies her childhood with Uzbekistan and with memories partly connected to food. “I have a very romantic picture of my hometown because I spent many hot summers outdoors playing hide and seek. The elders, or parents, would be sitting next to us on the benches we handmade and snack on the sunflower seeds,” she said. The remnants would be left on the floor for the kids to clean up the next day. Ruzanova did not know as a child that the communal nature of her neighborhood was quite rare. “I grew up and understood how special it is,” Angelica said.

When interactions and the tangible parts of memories are no longer so easily accessible, they are cherished far more. The aspects that can be recreated also become far more important. Although people may never be able to recreate a moment, they can recreate a meal, revisit a place, or see the same people. Ruzanova loves to eat the sunflower seeds to this day, though she complains about her inability to eat them gracefully mid-conversation like the aunts and grandmas she grew up around. 

Janie Bickerton, a New Orleans native, says, “Every time I go home now I get beignets. It used to be maybe once a year or not even.” When something becomes a rarity you want to capitalize when the opportunities are available, even if that means more than it used to be. “I feel like I get them more often now when I go home because I'm like ‘oh my gosh I’m home, I have to get beignets while I still can,’” Bickerton said. 

New Orleans food is something very important to her, and she has always found a way to integrate it when she cooks. Though she often does not cook from scratch, it tastes good and that is what matters to her. Red beans and rice and jambalaya are regular occurrences on the menu. She has begun to share her cooking with friends as well. 

Janie Bickerton makes a plate of her mother’s rice and beans after a day of Mardi Gras parades in New Orleans, Louisiana, on March 1, 2025.

“I’ve really enjoyed making jambalaya this semester, I've never made it before.” Bickerton said.  “I use a box mix but it's really good, and I get to share it with people and it’s fun.” Since entering college, her biggest introduction to New Orleans food for her friends is the annual King Cake, during Mardi Gras season. During her freshman year, her parents shipped her a cake and last year she flew back with one. Both times she divided it evenly among friends, purposefully not telling them about the surprise baby that is hidden inside. This year she says she will continue the tradition. Though she loves all sorts of New Orleans food and desserts, red beans and rice is her favorite and by far the most sentimental, reminding her of her mom. Many students expect Turkey for Thanksgiving break but Bickerton is fantasizing about something different. “Whenever I go back home, my mom always makes red beans and rice in the first three days,” and this time it will be made from scratch.

Home is mom’s cooking. It is handwritten recipes and bringing back foreign ingredients instead of souvenirs. Home is also box mix Japanese curry and canned beans. Recreating the recipes we grew up with means experimentation, imperfection and shortcuts. The kitchen is a place of self-discovery. Young adults have to navigate independence simultaneously by connecting to their identity. They are not just learning how to prepare cultural recipes but to cook as a whole. When the responsibility of living becomes our own, home-cooked meals and family recipes are more time-consuming than meaningful. Certain ingredients are hard to come by. What grandmothers perfected becomes mediocre at best. Suddenly nostalgia tastes different. But where disappointment is great, so is the reward. New traditions form and cooking improves with practice. Food is experienced uniquely for everyone, but it is also universal. It sustains the soul as well as the body. The meals we once shared with family are served to friends. What we eat and how we engage with food evolves. And, sometimes, when we visit back home mom is already preparing something on the stove.