New menu has students feeling rammed

By Alanna Rizza

Ryerson’s campus pub, the Ram in the Rye, has a new menu with increased prices and some students are pissed.

“The menu compared to the old one is horrible,” said fourth year electrical engineering student Edwin Alegre in a message to The Eyeopener.

Alegre said he has been going to the Ram every Friday for about three years. But this year he was disappointed with the selection and quantity of food being served.

According to Ryerson’s Student Centre website, the Ram’s menu is designed for students on a tight budget. However, some menu item prices have increased. For example, the Ram burger went from $7.99 to $8.49.

The raised menu prices are a result of the value of the Canadian dollar dropping, said Ryerson Student Centre general manager, Michael Verticchio via email.

“The Ram in the Rye has implemented a new menu with fresh, home made items. The size of our kitchen and storage spaces have always been an issue. So as new items are introduced, we have no choice but to remove others.”

Verticchio said student budgets are always taken into account when the menu is evaluated every year.

“We are listening to students and will be making periodic changes throughout the year.”

Students are particularly angry about the elimination of the beloved buffalo chicken wrap.

“I was handed a menu, and I couldn’t find the one thing I truly yearned for, a buffalo chicken wrap. I yearned for the spicy, savoury poultry more than anything else. I panicked, it wasn’t supposed to be this way,”wrote Joshua Kamaras-Garland on the Ram’s Facebook page.

The new menu has a kale salad and beet salad instead of the traditional caesar salad. Sweet potato fries have since been substituted for fried cauliflower. Other favourites, like nachos and chicken fingers, are also nowhere to be found.

“The Ram has always been called a student run pub, and if that’s the case, they should keep it that way in food, atmosphere, cost and all,” said Alegre. “Unless the Ram remedies this by reverting or making something as good as their old menu, many Ryerson students are going to be flooding to another pub nearby.”