‘The Secret of Cooking’ reminds us to savor the kitchen tips we’ve picked up

LEARNING TO COOK usually starts by learning to follow recipes. Then at some point, at least in my experience, cooking shifts to a feeling rather than a formula. “When is the roasted broccoli done?” becomes “When it smells done” rather than “15 minutes at 425 degrees F.”

What I’d forgotten was how much that culinary sixth sense owed to the knowledge accumulated over the years — not just stovetop trial and error, but particular people and cookbooks and meals. Bee Wilson reminds me of that in her absolutely grand new book, “The Secret of Cooking: Recipes For An Easier Life in the Kitchen” (W.W. Norton & Co., $40).

The British food writer provides 140 recipes, but really it’s a book of kitchen philosophy — how to “fit cooking into the everyday mess and imperfection of all our lives without it seeming like yet another undoable thing on the to-do list or yet another reason to berate ourselves for falling short.” Wilson tosses in practical tips along the way, but the overall message comforting me is her reminder that, “The best way to cook anything is the one that works best for you and your life right now.”

What also strikes me is Wilson’s memory for how she learned or developed these techniques and meals and general aphorisms. Wilson calls her omelets “amulet eggs” partly because of a magic ingredient (spoiler: It’s Dijon mustard) and partly from an 18th-century cookbook that used the phrase. Her tofu and chive gyozas are based on a wonton recipe by one of my favorite modern cookbook authors, Hetty McKinnon. And she nods to Danish cookbook author Trine Hahnemann for the kitchen rule that, “The cooking has to be done with love.”

If we mull over our kitchen favorites, we probably all have our own versions of that knowledge. Hahnemann’s quote reminds me of pie-making lessons with Port Angeles-based pie guru Kate McDermott, who tells her baking students, “You have to put love in the pie.”

And that roasted broccoli feels so automatic and mainstream now, but my inspiration for it years back was the Broccoli Blasted that’s still on the menu at the Black Bottle gastropub in Belltown. For excellent fries, Wilson learned from a “very niche” Lukas Volger cookbook that she should start by soaking peeled and cut potatoes in cold water to remove their excess starch; I’d heard the same from original Skillet restaurant owner Josh Henderson.

It goes on. When Wilson gave the tip that fresh ginger doesn’t need to be peeled before it’s grated, I thought about learning that surprising detail just a few months ago at the Ballard production facility of Firefly Kitchens, which uses mass quantities of fresh organic ginger in its kimchi and other fermented foods.

The concept of using time as an ingredient, one of Wilson’s smart strategies, first entered my kitchen consciousness through Brendan McGill of the Hitchcock Restaurant Group. McGill once spent a year preparing condiments for a dinner honoring Nancy Singleton Hachisu’s “Japanese Farm Food” book. He once told me he had pulled out a 10-year-aged shottsuru (fish sauce) that Hachisu had given him and made kimchi with it that was far too fishy … then let the kimchi mellow an extra year, after which it was “out of this world.”

I picked up plenty of new tips from Wilson (for one, I’ll be using my box grater in lieu of a knife to prepare mushrooms, carrots and tomatoes). But I also welcomed that renewed appreciation for everyone who’s taught and inspired me. This Marsala pear dessert from Wilson, for instance, was based on an Alice Waters recipe, but it faintly recalls the peaches in white wine that Seattle’s Delancey restaurant served when it opened in 2009. Delancey’s (chilled) recipe was adapted, I noticed just now, from David Tanis, who worked at Waters’ Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley for many years.

One delight of cooking is how we find our own paths to this kitchen magic, our own version of these spells of seasoning and satiation, this daily opportunity for savory new acquaintances.

Marsala Pears With Clove Cream
Pears are one fruit that can be quicker to eat cooked than raw because you can wait weeks for them to ripen. I love poached pears but find them time-consuming because of the peeling. These are much less labor-intensive, yet they look beautiful, standing proudly in the dish, like an autumnal still life from the Renaissance. I know that it’s traditional to cook pears in red wine, but I find their delicate flesh is better suited to white wine or something fortified, such as Marsala or sherry. This is based on an Alice Waters recipe.

For the pears:

10 underripe pears
1 cup dry Marsala or white wine (once I made this with leftover Cava, and it was delicious)
½ cup sugar

For the clove cream:
¾ cup plus 2 tablespoons heavy cream or Greek yogurt
1 tablespoon powdered sugar
A pinch of ground cloves

1. Rinse the pears and cut the bottoms off them so you can stand them upright in a ceramic or enamel baking dish. Mix together the wine and sugar, and pour this over the pears. Bake in the oven at 400 degrees F for an hour, basting the pears every 15 minutes or until caramel-golden and slightly shrunken. Let them cool on the side while you eat your main course.

2. While the pears are in the oven, make the clove cream. Put the cream and powdered sugar into a mixing bowl, and whisk with electric beaters until it forms soft peaks (be careful not to overmix, or you get butter). Or beat together the sugar and Greek yogurt with a whisk. Add a pinch of cloves, and mix well. Serve immediately, or keep covered in the fridge for a couple of hours.
— from “The Secret of Cooking” by Bee Wilson