Gulf Shores High School (GSHS) held its annual Farm to Table event on April 9 to showcase the schools' gardens and Baldwin County's produce by preparing a five-course meal using fresh and local food.

This event serves to inspire sustainability and use of local products in the high school students. Farm to Table is staffed and organized by students in the culinary, hospitality and tourism, and event planning classes. 17 students overall put on the event and worked together on preparation, presentation and entertainment throughout the night.

The Farm to Table event highlighted the greenhouse and sustainability practices at GSHS with five tours before dinner was served. There are five outdoor raised beds and 13 indoor beds in which the school produces herbs and vegetables throughout the year that are used in its cafeteria.

Within the greenhouse, the garden beds are irrigated and hydroponic gardens grow everything from leafy greens to lettuce.

"In the large hydroponic system we grow 300 lettuces, of which 60 heads are harvested weekly for GSCS (Gulf Shores City Schools) cafeterias," a program for the event reads.

The program also states there are 150 leafy greens and herbs that are regularly rotated within the smaller hydroponic system. Next to these systems, tomatoes and bell peppers are grown in buckets.

The greenhouse and sustainability tour continued through the greenhouse and to the compost corner where the school composts food scraps, shredded paper and pre-consumer cafeteria scraps. The compost containers have red wiggler worms. All of this serves to create a nutrient filled mixture, which is used in the GSHS gardens.

The last stop on the tour was at the pollinator gardens, which were built just last year. A small patch of grass near the student parking lot has now become a quaint sitting area filled with trees, bushes and perennial flowers that attract pollinators to the nearby greenhouse's outdoor garden.

After each tour, attendees were seated by students and given starters and refreshments. Starter options included garlic and parmesan Navy Cove oysters, smokey BBQ Navy Cove oysters or coastal shrimp skewers. For refreshments students had crafted a variety of mocktails for guests to choose from.

Next was a potato soup with rich flavors of a variety of vegetables, all of which were grown on site. The soup was served with homemade bread options like focaccia with roasted garlic spread and pumpernickel with kalamata tapenade.

After the soup, salad was served; the base of which was the GSHS hydroponic lettuce and leafy greens. Other vegetables such as tomatoes, peppers and radishes gave the plate a splash of tasty color. Guests had the options of delicious student-made dressings like creamy dill or basil vinaigrette to add to their salad.

After a brief pause for attendees to enjoy the music and hear from some of the student organizers, the entrees were served. Sweet magnolia chicken piccatas and blue oyster mushroom steaks were carried out by the student servers and delivered to their respective guests. Both entrees were served with herbed risotto.

After the entrees were finished and tables were cleared, the students brought out the final piece to the event: the stacks of carrot cake. Topped with a subtly sweet cream cheese icing, the dessert gave a nice final touch to the overall meal.

After each course had been served, the students were called to the stage to introduce themselves and their roles. GSHS culinary teacher Kristen Madsen, who recently placed among the 16 finalists for this year's Alabama Teacher of the Year, spoke on behalf of the students who put the event together.

"Every year, I'm not a crier, but I get choked up," Madsen said. "These kids have learned so much. They've learned about service, they've learned about cooking in the kitchen, they learned about real world things and they'll take this and they're going to be your next generation of chefs and restauranteurs and food innovators and they get to say they started right here."

She thanked GSCS administrators and board members for supporting her "crazy ideas" for innovative programs, giving students the opportunity to explore a culinary career path. She also thanked GSHS event planning and hospitality and tourism teacher Amanda Talantis for her partnership.