Sustainability and nutrition
Sustainability has been an important topic for the Studentenwerk SH for many years. The university catering team prefers to buy fresh food in the region and uses regional, organic or fair trade products in its dining halls and cafeterias wherever possible. Through the monthly Green Day, the Studentenwerk Schleswig-Holstein also contributes to climate protection. In 2017, the Studentenwerk was awarded the Kiel Sustainability Prize for its sustainable approach to food. The company also received the same prize for avoiding disposable cups.
Vegetarian and vegan meals are playing an increasingly important role in the Studentenwerk's dining halls and cafeterias. In recent years, demand has increased by almost eleven percent, with a shift from vegetarian to vegan. The range is therefore constantly being expanded with new, delicious dishes.
For those with allergies, our university catering team is constantly searching for low-allergen or allergen-free ingredients. For your information, the 14 most common allergens are labeled in our dining halls.
Important topics
Reusable crockery is a priority for us. We offer a deposit-free reusable to-go system at all locations, which you can use conveniently via an app. With our price regulation, we offer you an incentive to favour reusable crockery. The rental fee for a reusable cup is 15 cents and 25 cents for a bowl. This makes the reusable system significantly cheaper than disposable packaging made from renewable raw materials.
How does the Relevo crockery work?
- Download the app and select your Relevo crockery offer.
- Scan the QR code on the crockery, show the confirmation at the checkout and pay the service fee.
- Enjoy the taste!
- Return your Relevo crockery within 14 days and scan the QR code at the crockery return.
You can download the Relevo app from various app stores. The Relevo FAQ answers your initial questions.
You also always have the option of bringing your own clean crockery. We are happy to fill it. You will receive a discount of 10 cents for hot drinks in your own reusable cup. We also avoid waste in other areas of our canteens, cafeterias and café lounges by
- giving our guests the opportunity to save delicious, over-produced food from being thrown away. To this end, we offer them our Zero Waste Plate at some of our locations 15 minutes after the regular meal service in the canteens.
- In our cafeterias, we offer the Zero Waste Bag, which works on a similar principle. Our guests receive leftover cafeteria specialities here.
- In addition, as part of a test phase, we are cooperating with "To Good To Go" to offer people beyond the campus the opportunity to save food.
- Prepare meals predominantly "just in time" and re-produce as required.
- allow a flexible combination of side dishes with the main course and prepare the dishes according to tried and tested recipes so that there are rarely any leftovers on the plates.
- Promote flawless dishes that are left over despite careful planning and preparation as a "limited offer" on another opening day.
- Feed unavoidable leftovers to a biogas plant to generate electricity.
- hand over unavoidable leftovers to food sharing organisations that use them themselves or pass them on to charitable institutions.
In the spirit of sustainability, we want to give coffee grounds a second life. Our guests can collect coffee grounds free of charge from our cafeterias every day. As collection times vary from location to location, it is best to speak directly to our employees on site if you are interested.
The coffee grounds can be used in a variety of ways, for example as fertiliser, to speed up composting, to keep snails or ants away, to neutralise odours or for cosmetic applications.
The organic range in our canteens and cafeterias is becoming increasingly diverse. We only offer organic coffee and cocoa as well as various organic teas. In 2019, we purchased 6,240 kilos of coffee and 38,080 bags of tea. We purchase many dairy products, such as milk, sour cream and quark, as well as some poultry products from organic farms in northern Germany. Ingredients such as tofu, bulgur, quinoa and wholemeal pasta are exclusively organic and are labelled as such in our menu. Overview of organic products at the Studentenwerk
You can find out more about organic products on the information portal on organic farming.
In addition to coffee and drinking chocolate, the university cafeteria offers the complete range of teas fairly traded and in organic quality. This enables workers to secure their livelihood and improves the quality of life through health protection. In 2019, we sold a total of 529,678 hot drinks made from fair trade coffee, cocoa and tea.
The Studentenwerk SH also supports the Fairtrade Town campaign in the cities of Kiel, Lübeck and Heide as well as the Fairtrade University FH-Westküste as a cooperation partner. Further info at: www.fairtrade-deutschland.de
Farms from which we obtain our meat from species-appropriate husbandry pay great attention to animal welfare. For example, the animals are housed in stables with daylight and more space than required by law. Only GMO-free feed is used and no prophylactic antibiotics are administered. This way of keeping the animals has a significant effect on the quality of the meat.
We buy the meat from different suppliers in northern Germany, depending on the type of animal. You can read more about the requirements for keeping the animals here:
Markerup geese and ducks
Lübchiner straw pig
Severin organic eggs and brother cock
For years we have been abstaining from overfished fish species such as redfish and plaice in order to make a contribution to global overfishing. Now we are going one step further and offering catfish from sustainable aquaculture in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern for more fish diversity.
In 2019, we processed a total of 19 tonnes of meat from species-appropriate animal husbandry and sold 50,000 curry sausages. We source our species-appropriate chicken meat items exclusively from brother chicken farming.
We buy shell eggs or processed eggs mainly from free-range farming.
On the 1st Thursday of every month, we prepare mainly vegetarian dishes in our cafeterias. In individual dining halls, we offer selected meat dishes and deliberately avoid red meat, so that comparatively small amounts of greenhouse gases are produced. With Green Day, we want to make a contribution to climate protection and raise awareness for sustainable nutrition.
Green Day and the ongoing expansion of vegetarian and vegan food offerings have contributed to a significant increase in the meat-free share. Good Food - Cool Climate!
We buy our fresh food as regionally as possible. These ingredients are produced and processed in the northern German region.
We obtain the milk used in the refectories and cafeterias of the Studentenwerk SH and such products as quark, cream and natural yoghurt from the organic farm dairy Dehlwes. What is special about this family-run business is that it only uses organic milk from its own cows and from the neighbourhood within an average radius of 10 kilometres from the dairy. This guarantees short delivery routes and lower CO2 emissions. With our mineral water from Wittenseer, we also source products from the region, namely directly from Groß Wittensee in the district of Rendsburg-Eckernförde.
We source shell and fresh egg products exclusively from regional farming. In 2019, we processed around 45,500 regional eggs.
We are constantly expanding our vegan and vegetarian offerings. There is at least one vegan dish in the refectories every day. In addition, side dishes that are not suitable can be changed at no extra charge or sauce can be omitted to create a vegan dish from the available selection. The salad bars in some refectories also offer a wide vegan selection. In the cafeterias and café lounges, vegan cakes, desserts, salads, baked goods, bars and plant-based milk are available, and there is usually also a vegan hot food offer. The offer varies according to the size of the establishment. In 2019, we purchased 8,376 litres of plant-based drinks and sold 20,000 scoops of vegan ice cream.
At least 50 per cent of our canteen meals are vegetarian or vegan (WS: 21/22: 53.8 %*). With various campaigns, such as the World Vegan Day, the university catering promotes the vegan offer. Our commitment to an attractive vegan offer was recognised by the animal rights organisation PETA. The Kiel Mensa II and the Mensa Kesselhaus are thus among the most vegan-friendly refectories in Germany.
The Mensa Kesselhaus has been the first purely vegetarian refectory of the Studentenwerk SH since the winter semester 23/24.
*under pandemic conditions