Starting university is remarkably similar to entering the Big Brother house: nothing interesting happens until everyone gets rip-roaringly drunk. (How else will you get to snog the sex god or goddess from along the corridor?) It's perfectly natural to feel a bit shy when you've been unceremoniously plonked amidst a bunch of total strangers, and those ice-breaking alcoholic beverages will never have tasted so good.
You will find yourself in a bizarre parallel universe devoid of rules and restrictions. No one will crow-bar you into the lecture theatre of a blurry Tuesday morning. No one will trick you into eating your greens, nor will they call time on your consumption of mind-bending substances. It can get mightily messy out there, and, although you may view living out your hedonistic fantasies as a university rite of passage, if you do not maintain some semblance of balance, your health will go down the tubes faster than you can say "six tequila slammers and a packet of pork scratchings please".
You have essays to whip up out of thin air, volumes to read, tutorials, lectures, exams, part-time jobs and on top of all this, your daily daytime TV consumption quota must be met. Home and Away, my friend, will not watch itself. This hectic lifestyle is a veritable fast-track to a diet of salty, lardy snacks, and letting off steam in seedy, late-night drinking dens. However, if you play your cards right, you can have oodles of fun and still come out the other end with a few letters after your name that are not AA.
Alcohol is the most widely used drug in the UK - an estimated 90% of people over the age of 15 knock back booze on a regular basis, and 18- to 20-year-olds are its biggest market.
Try really hard to avoid binge drinking. If you can't even remember the final three hours of last night, what precisely was the point of making yourself suffer so? Women can safely drink up to two to three units a day, and men up to three to four units (one unit is half a pint of standard-strength beer, a small glass of wine or a pub measure of spirit). Never drink on an empty stomach and ply yourself with plenty of water, aiming to match each alcoholic drink with a glass of water.
If you do overdo it and find yourself stranded in hangover hell, your pickled body will need at least two "dry" days to recover. As well as making you very ill, alcohol is a depressant and can bring on anxiety and depression. Hair of the proverbial dog may take the edge off your morning-after shakes, but this is merely delaying and intensifying the inevitable comedown. This is how alcoholism starts.
As everyone old will tell you, you are about to enter into "the best days of your life". If this is true, you certainly won't want to be waddling about with booze-bloat by the end of your first term. As if alcohol's sizeable calorific content isn't distressing enough, after imbibing too much of the stuff, evil neon-signs advertising fry-ups with names like "The Gutbuster" draw us helplessly towards them like flies to dog muck.
Needless to say, this is not the stuff of a healthy balanced diet. Square meals are essential for both brainwork and enjoyment of extracurricular activities. When you're down to your last £5 and starving, buying a jumbo box of cornflakes and a jar of coffee may seem like your best chance of surviving the week, but this is a false economy. Think "nutritional value".
Food Standards Agency eggheads say you should eat five portions of fruit and veg daily and that cereals and starchy foods such as bread, rice, noodles, cereals, potatoes and pasta should make up about a third of your diet. Meat and fish may be pricey, but you cannot live without protein, and thankfully the vegetarian alternatives - pulses, eggs, nuts and beans - are far easier on the overdraft. Dairy produce, such as milk, cheese and yoghurt, is also important in moderate amounts.
You'll be surprised how much salt and sugar (of which we eat too much) is added to pre-prepared foods, so remember to read the labels. Besides, cooking with raw materials is largely cheaper, tastier and better for you than relying on ready meals. Stock up on basics such as sunflower oil (or olive oil if you're feeling flush), tinned tomatoes, rice, pasta, garlic and onions, then simply by adding various vegetables, flavours and sources of protein, anything is possible. Make giant batches of, say, pasta sauce and freeze individual portions for those essay panic nights, when you won't have enough time to cook. It's also a good idea to keep a loaf of sliced bread in the freezer so as to avoid mould-related disappointment.
If cheese toasties are truly all you're capable of rustling up, do yourself a favour and keep a lettuce (the plain ordinary "round" variety are dirt cheap) and a few tomatoes handy for some vital vitamins and iron. Organising regular big communal feasts with your housemates will ensure you get a decent feed every once in a while, and provide opportunities to purloin gems of cookery wisdom from your fellow students.
Finally, some important words of warning on student kitchens and their potential perils. They are famed for being so unhygienic that any self-respecting rat or cockroach would run a mile. But really all you need to do is clear up after yourself. Wash tea towels and empty rubbish bins (major germ breeding-grounds) regularly. After handling raw meat, poultry and fish, always wash your hands, utensils and surfaces thoroughly before contact with any other food.
Student kitchens are also fires waiting to happen. Keep the oven, hob and grill free from that unsightly and highly flammable fat and grease that builds up so fast. Never leave pans unattended. Take them off the heat if you are called away on urgent door- or phone-answering business. Make sure the cooker is turned off after use (sounds obvious but heaven knows we've all been there). And do not, I repeat, NOT, attempt to cook when tanked up.
