Everyday Food
Since May 2026 every student in France can eat a full meal for one euro, whatever their situation. Below that there are the student solidarity groceries, and below the supermarkets there are the discounters. This page is about feeding yourself on ordinary days, from the €1 tray to the weekly shop. For going out, see Restaurants & Bars.
What eating here costs
The Crous rate is national and it changed in May 2026, so ignore any guide still saying it is only for scholarship holders. The unit price on a shelf label is a legal requirement, not a courtesy of the shop.
Three ways to eat well for very little
Eating at the Crous
Set up Izly
Crous restaurants do not take cash at the till. Payment goes through Izly, the contactless student account attached to your student card or phone, which you top up online or in the app. Do this before your first lunch rather than in the queue, and load enough for a week.
Find the ones near you
The Crous of Toulouse-Occitanie runs Resto U', cafeterias, brasseries, a Crous Truck and other outlets across Toulouse and beyond it in Albi, Auch, Castres, Figeac and Tarbes. The one attached to your campus is rarely the only one you may use: any student card works at any of them.
Know what €1 buys
A main course plus at most two extras, meaning a starter, a cheese, a dessert or a fruit. It is a real meal rather than a token one, and it applies in the Resto U' and, where it can be done, in the other Crous outlets too. Apprentices, doctoral students and those on a service civique are included.
Plan around the hours
University restaurants are built around the weekday lunch rush and many close in the evening and at weekends. The Crous lists which outlets stay open late and on Saturdays and Sundays, and if you live more than twenty minutes from any of them there is a dedicated financial aid, the CARE card, to compensate.
The student solidarity groceries
Understand what they are
Real grocery shops, reserved for students and apprentices, selling food, hygiene and cleaning products at 70% to 90% below normal shop prices. This is not a charity parcel: you choose what you want. Le Rayon, run by the Toulouse food bank, has operated on the Capitole campus since 2022 and opened a second shop in Blagnac.
Check that it is for you
The one on the Capitole campus is not reserved for Capitole students, so where you study is not the question. What is assessed is your financial situation: you file a dossier and an admission panel decides. Tight rather than desperate is exactly the case these shops were built for, so apply and let them judge rather than deciding for yourself that you do not qualify.
Apply online
Create an account on the Rayon site, fill in the file and upload the documents that show your situation. The admission panel answers within three days. Note that you cannot register at both shops, so pick whichever is closer to where you live.
Book your first visit
Once accepted you book an appointment for the first shop, then come back during opening hours. Le Rayon on the Capitole campus opens Monday 2pm to 7pm and Tuesday to Friday 1pm to 7pm; the Blagnac shop runs Tuesday to Thursday, 12.30pm to 6pm. Both are also designed as places to sit and meet people, not just tills.
The rest of the weekly shop
Crous restaurants and payment
- Where to eat, Crous Toulouse-OccitanieThe full list of Resto U', cafeterias, brasseries and mobile outlets, plus which of them open in the evening and at weekends, and the CARE aid for students living far from any of them.
- Paying for your mealThe current rates, how the €1 meal works, and how to set up and top up Izly, the contactless account used at every Crous till.
- What's on the menuDaily menus across the Crous outlets, with nutrition information, so you can check before crossing campus.
Food help in Toulouse
- Le Rayon, campus Toulouse CapitoleThe food bank's student grocery: food, hygiene and cleaning products at 70% to 90% below shop prices, on application. Open Monday 2pm to 7pm, Tuesday to Friday 1pm to 7pm. Five minutes' walk from place Saint-Pierre.2T rue des Puits Creusés, 31000 Toulouse
- Le Rayon, BlagnacThe second shop, in the apprentice training centre near the Georges Brassens stop on tram T1. Open Tuesday to Thursday, 12.30pm to 6pm. You may register at one shop or the other, not both.21 avenue Georges Brassens, 31700 Blagnac
- Croix-Rouge, campus Jean JaurèsA solidarity grocery on the Jean Jaurès campus handing out food baskets for €1, Tuesdays and Thursdays from 4pm to 6.30pm. Access goes through the university student health service.
- LinkeeFree food parcels at fixed weekly distributions in Toulouse, with registration online beforehand.
- Cop1 Solidarités ÉtudiantesStudent-run food distributions, open to students on registration.
- Société Saint-Vincent-de-PaulA free meal on Tuesday evenings from 7.30pm, with no conditions and no registration at all.21-23 rue Valade, 31000 Toulouse (near place Saint-Pierre)
- Food aid overview, University of ToulouseThe official list of every scheme across the Toulouse academy, kept up to date. Worth checking, since these schemes move their days and locations more often than this page can follow.
Frequently asked questions
Yes. Since 4 May 2026 the rate applies to every student, not only scholarship holders and students in hardship as it did from 2020. It covers holders of a student card, apprentices with a carte d'étudiant des métiers, doctoral students and people on a service civique. Rates are set nationally and have moved before, so check the Crous site before building a budget on it.
That is not your call to make, and the question is the wrong way round. Le Rayon assesses a dossier on your actual financial situation, answers in three days, and exists precisely for students whose budget is tight in an ordinary way. Applying costs you a form and three days. Deciding in advance that you do not qualify costs you a year of paying full price.
Yes. A student card is a student card, and the Crous network is open to all of them. The same goes for the solidarity grocery on the Capitole campus, which is not reserved for Capitole students. In practice you will use whichever is nearest to where you happen to be.
No, and this catches people out on the first day. Crous tills run on Izly, a contactless account linked to your student card or your phone that you top up online. Set it up before you turn up hungry.
For staples, the discounters, and it is not close. Where the big chains compete is on range and on fresh produce, not on the basics. The bigger variable is store size: the small city-centre branch of a chain costs meaningfully more than that same chain's hypermarket for the identical product, so do the big shop out of town and keep the corner shop for what you forgot.
Then skip the application route. Linkee and Cop1 run free distributions that need only an online registration, the Croix-Rouge grocery on the Jean Jaurès campus hands out baskets for €1 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and Saint-Vincent-de-Paul serves a free meal on Tuesday evenings with no conditions and no paperwork whatsoever.
Not at the Crous, where there is a vegetarian option daily and menus are published in advance with their composition. Outside, Toulouse is a student city with a broad food scene, so vegetarian restaurants and halal butchers are easy to find, though a traditional southwestern kitchen is built on duck and pork and will have little for you.
Cooking for one is grim
Eat with the community
This page is written and kept current by AEGEE Toulouse, the volunteer association that's welcomed international students to Toulouse since 2025. Half of eating well as a student is not doing it alone: AEGEE Toulouse cooks, shares and eats together regularly, and the WhatsApp group is where those evenings get organised.
Join the WhatsApp group