BEREA, Ohio — The Browns rookies have been showing off their competitive nature on the field early into their offseason workouts, but on Friday, that competition made its way into the kitchen as the team held their annual Rooks to Cooks event at Baldwin Wallace University.
"This is our annual cooking class. Instead of sitting in the classroom talking about nutrition and putting things on a PowerPoint, I love to get the guys out, get their own hands on different things, experience, learn a different skill, come out here and have a little fun," said Browns director of player engagement, Ron Brewer.
Each year, the Browns partner with the dining services at Baldwin Wallace University, just down the street from where they practice, to teach the players life skills as many of them prepare for their first taste of adult life post-college.
"The partnership between Baldwin Wallace and Browns is what makes this university particularly special because we're just two minutes away from these fantastic athletes and watching them cook... they're doing very, very well," said Lee Fisher, the incoming president of Baldwin Wallace University.
The day began with a team competition, players paired up in groups of two and tasked with creating the best charcuterie board. Players loaded the boards up with meats and cheeses. Some, like long snapper Brent Matiscik and Dillon Gabriel, went intricate, folding procuitto roses and arranging the plate with plenty of color. Others, like linebacker Carson Schewsinger and safety Donovan McMillon, tried making art, turning their board into a football field with cheese-cube goalposts.
The teams consisting of the rookie quarterbacks, Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders, took the win for best charcuterie board.
"Everything in life is a process. Things [aren't] microwaved nowadays. It's going to take time," Sanders said. "It was my first time cooking on a hot stove, so I was thankful."
That was the next portion of the day—cooking on a hot stove. The Browns players worked individually on their next task of making rasta pasta.
With a Baldwin Wallace University instructor from the dining services leading them, the players learned how to mince and dice garlic, chop onions, cook chicken and shrimp and put together a flavorful pasta dish for themselves.
With guys like defensive tackle Mason Graham showing off his skillet moves, tossing chicken around the pan like a pro, and defensive end Adin Huntington creating a masterpiece worthy of Top Chef, there was no shortage of fun or flavors in the kitchen Friday afternoon.
Two players walked away with awards for best pasta, linebacker Easton Mascarenas-Arnold taking the first-place prize and running back Dylan Sampson taking second.
"We came in here, I think we all had fun today, learned something new," Sampson said. "I'm going to cook and I'm going to tell [my family] I did a good job and everybody liked my plate."
The event was a fun competition for the guys, but also a great way for the newest members of the Browns to bond together while taking home invaluable life skills.
"We need our guys to be together when they're out there on the field, so I want to do something that adds to that. When these guys look at each other on a field, they have experiences together, something like this adds to that," Brewer said. "What I want them to be able to take is, one, they have fun. Yeah, they learned a couple of cooking skills, learned how to cut, things like that, but most importantly, they had a good time competing and were together with each other."
