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Campers cook with UAF greenhouse produce

Budding chefs got a taste of science this June.

Students in two cooking camps at the University of 91��Ƶ Fairbanks used tomatoes grown during research into greenhouse productivity.

“The kids loved it,” said Sean Walklin, a camp instructor who is also lead chef and coordinator for the UAF Community and Technical College’s culinary arts and hospitality program.

Participants in the Seasoned Chef Camp and the Baking Blitz Camp, both organized by UAF’s Summer Sessions office, made homemade pizza sauce and French galettes with the tomatoes.

Walklin has gotten tomatoes and bell peppers from the Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station greenhouse, attached to the Arctic Health Research Building on the Troth Yeddha' Campus, since 2023. The tomatoes, grown and provided by UAF horticulture professor Meriam Karlsson, are part of ongoing research into efficient greenhouse crop production in 91��Ƶ.

Karlsson grows bell peppers and tomatoes year-round, even through the winter when seasonally short days and low sun angles make natural light unreliable. Her research uses innovative lighting strategies to maximize plant production while optimizing energy use. She experiments with lighting inside the plant canopy (rather than just light from above), and has found that this approach increases both the yield and fruit size in certain tomato varieties. 

In the past, Karlsson has designed trellising and pruning experiments on bell peppers and devised strategies that produced significantly more peppers per plant. She said donating the subjects of these experiments to the culinary program makes a lot of sense. 

“It’s a good collaboration,” she said. “We can support them, and they are educating our students.”

Walklin reached out to Karlsson because he was having a hard time finding good-quality produce in the winter. Last year, around 700 pounds of produce were delivered to the culinary program.

Walklin likes to use local products when he can, but the window to buy local tomatoes in Fairbanks is narrow. 

“What’s special about these tomatoes is that they come in the dead of winter,” Walklin said. “They taste like summer.” 

From the dead of winter to mid-summer, Walklin can use the greenhouse produce. He and his students also showcase the produce at the Borealis Bistro, the student-run restaurant that opens each spring. This year’s menu featured the greenhouse tomatoes in a Caprese salad and the roasted red peppers in a sauce. 

“We feature them all over the menu,” Walklin said. He uses them wherever he can to highlight local ingredients and instill in his students a sense of place.  

For Walklin, the collaboration is about more than good food, it’s also about students learning about the work of connecting with producers. 

“You’re connecting with people who put great work in, and you get a great product out to the public,” he said.

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