One cool thing about our bachelor days was cooking whatever you want. And not just the staples like tomato soup and cheese sandwiches. A guy finds ways to be creative when it comes to solo, self-servant cooking recipes. Some are just sheer genius and others so bad you wouldn’t feed it to your dog.

Ahh, but sometimes the stars align and the greatest creations that could never ever be duplicated are those generated at the end of long night out. I’m takin’ ‘bout MUNCIE FOOD! We’ve all been there. Those are the nights that you could kick the heck out of Bobby Flay, Masaharu Morimoto and Michael Symon and become the Greatest Iron Chef EVER, because nobody could match that late-night, limited-ingredient, mish-mash that you can put together at 2:30 IN THE MORNING!

Unfortunately not many of those classics made it to the recipie book, due to the conditions in which they were created. However, one did manage to make it through the years and that is the famous Big Dan Rav-Chill-A. It started with a winter day urge to make chili using ground chuck, Italian sausage, veal base with a combination of beans, peppers, onions and more. A week long version of this concoction (having plenty of time to assimilate) was staring me in the face that eventful morning. As I removed the meal from the fridge and to the stove stop…(because back then we never used a microwave to make late night meals LOL) I realized that my hunger was greater then the leftover content. Then that historic moment when I realized I had a can of ravioli in the cupboard. VOLA! Well, not quite. Because it still needed that EXTRA KICK. Hot Sauce…Chili Peppers…and anything else that looked like it could be used to destroy stomach tissue went into this now boiling pot of delectability. And hence the birth of RAV-CHILL-A.

The only reason it made it though the annals of cooking history is the fact that friends asked the next day “What the H*** did you cook last night? And God was kind enough to allow me to be cognizant enough to remember what I did (that and the fact I never cleaned up my mess after consuming my late night meal.

The cool thing is that these kind of concoctions and many other creative culinary inventions will no longer go un-noticed.

Residents across Ohio now have the opportunity to transform their food product dream into a reality with the Ohio Signature Food Contest, running through June 22, 2017. Sponsored by the Center for Innovative Food Technology (CIFT) the contest will showcase new, innovative products from across the state.

Products do not need to be fully designed or ready for market, rather an ability to communicate a specific vision. How cool is that?

CIFT will review all applicants and select semi-finalists to meet with a panel of judges consisting of industry experts. Applicants will provide samples of the product and discuss market opportunities and business plans. Applicant must be the person representing the product during the judging phase in order to be considered. CIFT will provide the plates for sampling purposes.

Call 419-535-6000, ext. 117, with questions or check them out on the web at http://ciftinnovation.org.

So if you have that special recipe, handed down from grandma or simply created under the influence and you would like to share it … get it out there for everyone to enjoy!

Here’s seeing you, in Ohio Country!