Now I got hungry :-)
I spent my military service in a station being awarded with "best kitchen" many years in a row, the officers mess and conscript mess was combined, so we got better food than most conscripts. Particularly the Friday lunch buffets were really fantastic. Unfortunately most of the Fridays I would have to pack my lunch pack during our breakfast buffet and eat it while sitting at my post inside a mountain.
We got food for free from the mess, but we also had an alternative - a canteen where we could pay for eating some pizzas (I don't remember, I think it wasn't much good - probably frozen pizzas). We didn't have a buffet for dinner, it was typically only one dish to choose from. Once or twice a week we would have fish. Fish wasn't that popular with most of the conscripts, so we were talking about it and my colleagues concluded ... "today we'll eat in the canteen". I think I was the only conscript eating in the mess that day, and there was some really delicious halibut to be had.
I came back to the university during one of my leaves and took a hot chocolate from the dispenser in the canteen - and totally forgot that I also should pay for it :-)