“It’s monumental! Compared to my kitchen for our 200 seats… This is the first time I have visited the hospital ones. I’m impressed with the logistics. It’s interesting to see how you can prepare homemade food with such quantities. This gives another image of the hospital kitchen…”. Joseph Oulhen, from the restaurant Les Maraîchers, at La Pam, in downtown Brest, is impressed this Thursday morning, October 3, 2024 at the Cavale Blanche University Hospital.
Automation (here a conveyor belt) is necessary to ensure the quantities essential to hospitals and nursing homes, in particular. (Photo Le Télégramme/David Cormier)
The hospital prepares 6,500 meals per day
It was he who designed the northern Finistère version of the Great Meal. This national operation is intended for school canteens, colleges, company restaurants, residences for the elderly, high schools, university or traditional restaurants, hospitals, clinics, etc. For patients, families and staff. That is more than 8,000 seats, including 5,000 in the Brest Métropole area (3,000 at the University Hospital alone). It was necessary to have the hospital’s sized tool, which prepares some 6,500 meals per day for its various sites. A number of machines have been acquired recently to save time in peeling or cutting vegetables, in particular. And 124 people take turns there.
The menu? Joseph Oulhen chose it vegetarian. Candied tomatoes and fresh cheese and chives as a starter; black farz, roasted vegetables, mushroom cream as a main course; apple and buckwheat crumble, salted butter caramel for dessert. Certain elements were mixed, adapted for children in nurseries or hospital patients and residents of nursing homes who cannot chew. Like the pumpkin soup in the evening.
After the Ifac (Apprentice Training Institute) in Guipavas two years ago, it is the City and the metropolis of Brest, this year, which are organizing the event locally. “We want to reduce meat consumption: less, but of better quality,” adds Fragan Valentin-Leméni, deputy mayor of Brest in charge of promoting physical and mental health. “The French are too meaty. This impacts health, the environment, animal welfare, consumes land and is costly for families. We want to promote the three Vs: more plant-based, more real (more organic), more varied. And more local too. It gives so much pleasure and nutritional benefits.”
New recipes, new equipment
“We have had more than 250 new recipes over the past two years,” explains Aline Quéau-Commault, head of catering at the CHU. “We want to fight against malnutrition (it is decreasing, particularly in nursing homes, where we have been able to reduce food supplements at the same time) and waste. While giving the choice to refill. 30 to 35% of our meals are vegetarian, which has reduced CO2 emissions by six tonnes compared to meat dishes. Overall, our carbon saving was 1,121 tonnes between April 2022 and June 2024.” The spices perfume the “hot” part of the equipment. The dishes are ready to be distributed. Thanks to equally well-oiled logistics: that of transport.
