Forkprint wins Rep. Chrissy Houlahan’s 2025 Congressional App Challenge in Pennsylvania’s Sixth District

When asked what inspired the creation of PantryLink, the students said, “As students, we hear about climate change all the time. We’re told to recycle, bike, or carpool to destinations, and turn off the lights upon leaving a room to conserve electricity — but people rarely mention dinner. As someone who loves food and cooking, I never truly thought about how what I ate might affect the planet in any meaningful way. In my eyes, power plants and sprawling urban areas were the only real culprits of our planet’s ever-rising temperature.

“That changed when I came upon an article on farms and agricultural practices that revealed something new to me: the reason agriculture accounted for such a large portion of Earth’s emissions was the cattle. Not the factories, not the shipping, not the packaging. It was the cows’ digestive systems that were responsible for churning out the methane building up in our atmosphere. The problem suddenly felt closer to home, and there was a clear course of action for me to take: eat less beef. It made me wonder what other choices in my kitchen were quietly adding up without me noticing.

“It was this realization that inspired me to create Forkprint – an app that helps people take climate action through simple, thoughtful ingredient swaps in their daily cooking. Through Forkprint, I want to share my awareness with other people that the impact of their everyday meals is much greater than they may realize. Even small changes in the kitchen can make a meaningful difference for our planet.”