In 2022, he served more than three million meals, making him the French champion. Faced with a marked increase in attendance, the Crous Bretagne must face a major challenge: to offer a diversified diet in a hyper-constrained budgetary context. Meal cost for the student: 3.30 euros and even 1 euro for scholarship holders. Cost price for the Crous: 8.50 euros per meal. “Prices have only increased by five cents since 2016. In the context of inflation, this is a real service rendered”, assures Yann-Eric Prouteau, as if to defend the action of the State in the matter. “We know that the period is difficult for students. As for the state grant, it quite simply depends on the number of meals served. With more than three million dishes sent in one year, the Breton branch has resources but has to do with a constrained budget, where each line is studied.
At the start of the 2022 school year, the director of Crous Bretagne had been the target of strong criticism. His administration was accused by the unions, with supporting photos, of serving rations that were too meager to meet the hunger of the students. Its director recognizes that certain remarks were justified. “They allowed us to move forward. We have trained all our cooks to offer more varied food. But some photos had been constructed, ”he defends himself. To prepare the meals, the Crous cooks must now strictly follow the recipes established on the basis of the recommendations of the collective catering and nutrition market study group. “But each person has different needs. A student always has the possibility of asking for more if he wishes”, assures Marcos Martinez, catering coordinator at Crous Bretagne.
To cope with galloping inflation, the Crous has decided to put its teams back to cooking, imposing training on its employees so that they relearn how to transform, and not just reheat. If the food at U restaurants has not always been renowned for its taste, it has the merit of offering a hot and diversified meal to a generation that we know is increasingly precarious. According to the students, the quality of the meals served has even improved significantly. Since the establishment of the one-euro meal, which had almost been generalized with the vote of a deputy, more and more students have wanted to eat there. But when they knock on the door of U restaurants, their request does not stop at a piece of steak and fries or pasta bolo. What students seek is to eat their fill.
More and more vegetarians
Faced with this increase in attendance, the Crous Bretagne had to organize itself, in particular for the purchase of its foodstuffs, the price of which has exploded. In Rennes, the decision was made to offer real vegetarian meals. Today, vegetables represent 50% of meals served in U restaurants in the Breton capital. “It was a request that came from the students, not a desire to save money,” assures the director. “We were also asked to maintain a good supply of meat and fish because outside the Crous, many students cannot afford it. We will not abandon it, ”promised its deputy director. The price of fruit has also been lowered by 45 cents, in order to encourage their consumption.
In the Breton capital, the decision was made to open a university restaurant per campus every evening of the week. Always with the aim of feeding young people when their fridge is empty. Until then, only a U restaurant was open during dinner time in Rennes. A little skinny in a city with over 70,000 students. From this start of the school year, in Beaulieu, Villejean and Hoche, students will be able to eat their fill in the evening.