In college, food can be a struggle. Yes, a crunchy, juicy, fried chicken sandwich from the Atrium might be the quickest thing you can grab before your next lecture, but there has to be a healthier option.

So maybe you want to shed a few pounds or maybe you’re just one of those obsessed health nuts, but if you want to do your body a favor, you’ll have to get creative and or ganized.

First, when you go into the dining facility of your choice, don’t just walk toward the most appetizing smell; take a look at the menu and choose items that are “Wolf-approved.”

The little paw print denotes that the food contains either less than three ingredients or contains no trans-fat, less than nine grams of sugar, one nutritionally redeem ing quality and less than 600 calories for entrees (less than 240 calories for snacks) with less than 30 percent of the calories coming from fat.

Second, modify your order. For example, if you order a salad, ask for dressing on the side so you can control the amount of dressing you consume or avoid the bacon, according to Lisa Eberhart, Dining and Catering Opera tions dietician.

“Some of it is a science and some of it is an art,” Eberhart said.

Even at the dining halls, which have the largest vari ety of options, you don’t have to eat what is right in front of you.

University Dining Nutri tion Department Coordi nator Michelle Borges said students should combine different foods from the din ing hall to create their own concoctions.

According to Borges, there is a wide range of variations that can be made at the din ing halls.

For those who don’t want to eat inside the dining hall, to-go boxes allow you to take whatever you can fit inside the box in addition to a piece of fruit for the same price as eating in.

“The beauty of going to the dining hall and filling your to-go box with ingredients you want to use later is that you don’t have to buy all that stuff,” Eberhart said. “Stu dents can get a whole pepper, a whole onion, and a whole bunch of humus…There was this cool recipe at this confer ence I went to and all it was was pita bread, and then hu mus, and then some leftover fresh vegetables from their salad bar. So they sautéed the vegetables, they put it on top of the pita bread and the hummus, put salad greens on top of it and then put balsam ic vinegar on it and then you ate it like a salad and it was really good. So that would be a simple thing you could do just in the dining hall.”

A to-go box saves time in the morning as well, accord ing to Borges, who said one of the nutritionists recom mended stocking to-go boxes with breakfast items available at dinnertime in the dining halls, should students want those extra minutes of sleep.

“I think in general peo ple need to look at variety. There’s not one specific food that’s a healthy food, and va riety really does help people build a better diet,” Eberhart said.

Variety comes in the form of a diet filled with fruits and vegetables, lean protein sources (which don’t neces sarily have to be meat) and quality, whole-grain carbo hydrates.

According to MyPlate, a government website dedicat ed to proper nutrition, people should make half their plate fruits and vegetables, at least half of their grains whole-grains and switch to fat-free or low-fat (1 percent) milk.

It also helps to track your meals through mobile appli cations such as MyFitnessPal, which lists the nutritional in formation of all of the foods within the dining halls, ac cording to Eberhart. The application provides dietary guidelines such as daily ca loric intake for users based on their health goals, height, weight, age and fitness levels.

The general nutritional rec ommendations taken from MyPlate below use the aver age height, weight and fitness levels of college students as reported by the CDC.