You may know him as the lead singer in the local group Mi Casa, but in the past year, J’Something has forged his way into the foodie scene, starring in his own cooking show, appearing at nationwide expos and, this year, opening a restaurant in Menlyn, Pretoria.

I learnt how to cook by watching my mom, helping her and listening. She taught me how to season with reckless abandon (within reason, of course, but I never, ever listen to a recipe when it tells me to add just 1 teaspoon of cumin; also, cumin is literally the most underrated spice ever, but more to come on that in the future).

When we planned to put our very first foodie face on the cover of MyKitchen, it had to be someone who also learnt how to cook this way – because, let’s be real, most of us are self-taught chefs.

His approach to food is honest and family-focused. It’s delicious. It’s a Friday night pizza party. It’s deep-fried mac ‘n’ cheese. It’s a lamb feast with spicy hummus and chilli, garlic and cumin flatbreads. It’s real.

‘My whole life, the only thing that I’ve actually grown up with, that’s in my blood, is food,’ J’Something told us on the day of his cover shoot, sitting over a bowl of smashed avo (he’s training pretty hard these days, so he keeps it healthy wherever possible).

‘How food started for me was kind of because of music. You grow up as a kid and you have this dream of singing, you know, and wanting to be like Michael Jackson. And then it happens. And two years into my music career, I thought I needed to create something that would chill me out. And so I started cooking at home.’

J’Something and the team spent the rest of the day cooking up the feast you’ll see in the April issue of MyKitchen, juggling eggs, baking brownies, then eating brownies, dancing and making a mess with flour.

Catch all the fun, recipes and insight from J’Something in the upcoming issue. I’m sure after poring over the pages, you’ll do exactly what I did: spent the entire weekend cooking and baking and eating, of course.