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Over the sizzling of pans and beat of knives hitting cutting boards, students’ light-hearted chatter rises.

They’re gathered in �ǿմ�ý  University’s new state-of-the-art teaching kitchen in the School of Medicine, made possible in part through a $400,000 anonymous gift. 

Across the 2,300-square-foot facility—which features 48 workstations, a full walk-in pantry, an on-site laundry room and a dishwashing area—undergraduate, graduate and doctoral students learn to make their own nutritious (and delicious) meals. That experience, in turn, equips them to guide their patients, and members of the broader community, toward healthier eating habits.

The teaching kitchen “gets students in the kitchen doing, so instead of just listening to the concepts, we’re really integrating it into the practice,” explained instructor Lindsay Malone (GRS ’10, nutrition).

It’s a critical lesson, as 42% of adults and 20% of children in the United States—115 million people in total—are obese, a health concern that can lead to myriad chronic conditions, including death.

“If you have two minutes [with a patient], tell them what they can eat, not what they can’t eat,” said Department of Nutrition Chair Hope Barkoukis, PhD (GRS ’75, ’97, nutrition). “We’re not teaching them to be Martha Stewart. They are learning about simple food education to really improve health.”

Believed to be the largest teaching kitchen of its type in the U.S., �ǿմ�ý’s new space is a “lively education setting” where they hope to engage the community, said Stephanie Harris, PhD (GRS ’07, ’11, nutrition), the Helen Moss Foundation-Schoff Family Professor in Integrative Oncology.

Originally published in the winter 2024 issue of Forward Thinking magazine