Alton Brown, Master Chef, Chopped, and my mom served as my culinary instructors. To be fair, I think that’s about as good as it gets. This serves as the first verification step to my home chef status.

The second being, as a former collegiate-level offensive lineman, I know good eats.

After my football career came to an end, I didn’t have a reason to be at that size, so I had to find a way to lose that weight. I became a vegetarian for a few years, transitioned to pescatarian, and now have no restrictions when it comes to food.

In that journey, I’ve cooked a lot of odd meals. Many of them were a sloppy culmination of whatever was in my pantry. “Make up a recipe night” became a staple in my home.

The key to making up these recipes was making sure that even if my pantry wasn’t full, my spice cabinet was. Overloaded, disorganized, and pungent - the 3 most important qualities in curating a well-rounded storage space for your spices.

It started with your basics. Garlic powder, Italian seasoning, crushed red pepper, and salt. Before I knew it, I was buying bulk containers of garam masala, Sichuan peppercorns, and every dried chili powder you can think of.

Next came years of experimentation. A combination of spices, hot sauces, canned vegetables - you name it. I would bring out my biggest pan or Wok and start tossing things in like I was imitating a Jackson Pollock painting.

A few times, it was awful - most times it was solid - and sometimes I created something brilliant - only to forget what I added in the first place.

My goal is to record and actually remember what makes these at-home dishes so special and inspire others to do the same.

Whether you go for broke and experiment, or need to audible on some missed ingredients on a recipe you are following, improvisational cooking is where we can find the intersection of culinary and creativity.

Let’s hope we can keep making good food.