Author shares her delicious secrets

Hot tips. Impeccable sources. As a professionally trained chef who teaches others how to cook, Linda Carucci has been sharing insider information for 20 years. Some of her students have gone on to become chefs. But at heart, she is an advocate for everyday cooks. “Consider me your own personal kitchen buttinsky,” the Oakland, Calif., resident often says at the start of a class.

And it is everyday cooks for whom she has produced her first book, “Cooking School Secrets for Real World Cooks” (Chronicle Books, $22.95, paperback), released this summer.

In it, she shares hundreds of tidbits. Among them: how to make risotto six hours ahead (refrigerate it midway through adding the stock); why you shouldn’t put overly wet meat on the grill (it prevents the meat from caramelizing properly); and what the correct water temperature is for washing leeks (warm).

In addition, she provides practical advice about kitchen equipment, plate presentation and the tasting of food while it’s being cooked.

Cookbooks written by cooking school instructors are nothing new. What separates Carucci’s from many of the other efforts is that it is unusually accessible and well organized. Its 103 recipes were triple-tested by 116 home cooks across the country. Since being a good teacher also means being a good listener, Carucci has incorporated many of the questions that came up during recipe testing.

Not all of Carucci’s answers are definitive. For “Should I rinse fish and shellfish?” she gives pros and cons and then describes her personal technique. (She rinses fish steaks and fillets only if they’re not impeccably fresh. She rinses thawed, peeled shrimp, and rinses briefly after she deveins shrimp. But she hardly ever rinses bay or rock shrimp to retain “the flavor of the sea” as much as possible. Clams and mussels, which are sandy, are always rinsed.)

The book’s accompanying Recipe Secrets are set along the margins of most pages. For her Tomato-Cheddar Soup (recipe follows), Carucci explains the benefits of a mere quarter-teaspoon of baking soda; when it is added, the mixture should foam up a bit and then subside, which proves that the soda is active. When adding a splash of vinegar to just-cooked green beans, the timing is crucial (added while the beans are too hot, it will turn them grayish-green). The finest-quality prosciutto is not needed when making grilled stuffed chicken (the star component of the dish, after all, is chicken, not proscuitto). To coax the most flavor from blanched vegetables, salt them twice (the water they’re cooked in and the ice-water bath afterward).

Carucci, 49, has a natural gift for instruction. It comes across in her book, which is already in its second printing – a considerable achievement for a cookbook that isn’t tied to a television-chef persona – and during her classes. She is precise, but not fussy. In person she’s calm and warm, prone to hugs.

During a recent Saturday morning class at the Sur La Table store in Arlington, Va., her instructions to a few dozen cooks were as clear as those in the book, and they took into consideration the conditions that home cooks face. Sur La Table’s volunteer assistants that day could pick up tips just by watching Carucci set up. For instance, she took the label from the package of lamb and stuck it on the dish the meat was marinating in so she could remember its weight. Her prep trays were stacked on the wheeled rack in order of use.

“I’ve been around for different instructors, and she’s the most organized I’ve seen here,” said assistant Lisa Sorce, of Arlington.

Teaching moments continued steadily, even in the simple action of popping a jellyroll pan of zucchini-olive oil cake batter into the oven. “I’m going to be a little nudgy here,” she said. “Touch the back of the pan to the back of the oven, and then bring it forward halfway toward the glass. The cake will bake more evenly.” Heads nodded around the room.

At one point, Carucci, dressed in a crisp white chef’s coat and comfortable shoes, noticed that an assistant was about to use two partial packages containing different brands of orzo, for a salad made with a medley of small tomatoes and fresh mint.

“The brands might cook differently,” she explained. “That has happened to me with packages of arborio rice for risotto. You’ll get some grains that are chewier than others and wonder, ‘What did I do wrong?’ ” Heads nodded.

Instead of mixing brands, Carucci saves the odds and ends of opened packages to add to soups or leftovers.

Carucci’s background is a mix of education and food. She was an associate dean of students of Occidental College in Los Angeles from 1981 to 1983. She had always been interested in cooking, and followed her passion to the California Culinary Academy. “Cooking takes time, and I find that pleasurable,” she says. “I just like to have my hands in food.” She graduated from the culinary academy and later returned to serve as its dean.

Carucci has worked as a private chef, restaurant cook-manager and caterer. She and her husband, a contractor, remodeled the kitchen at their home with an eye toward her teaching cooking classes there. Along the way, she earned the respect of well-known California chefs including Thomas Keller, who called her the consummate cook and coach. And in 2002, she was named Cooking Teacher of the Year by the International Association of Culinary Professionals.

For the past year, she has been the Julia Child curator of food arts at the American Center for Wine Food and the Arts in Napa, Calif. She considers it a “dream job.”

There’s only one problem, a problem that is familiar to home cooks: There’s no time to make dinner.

“I had no idea while I was writing this book that I’d accept the full-time-plus food curator position, close down my home cooking school and join the ranks of working stiffs who come home after work every day and make supper,” Carucci says.

These days, the cookbook author confesses, she typically resorts to taking salmon or pork chops out of the freezer in the morning for her husband to prepare. Fortunately, she says, he has a brand-new cookbook to guide him.

Tomato-Cheddar Soup

Linda Carucci sprinkles Recipe Secrets throughout her book. For her tomato-cheddar soup, she notes that the baking soda will neutralize the acid in the tomatoes and prevent the milk from curdling. To incorporate the cheese, remove the soup from the heat before adding it, and stir in a little at a time.

Serve this light, frothy soup either hot or cold. Adapted from her new book,”Cooking School Secrets for Real World Cooks” (Chronicle).

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 yellow onion, finely chopped

2 pounds Roma tomatoes, cored and cut into 1-inch chunks (may substitute one 28-ounce can of diced tomatoes)

2 cups homemade or low-sodium chicken stock

2 sprigs thyme (may substitute 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme)

1 teaspoon kosher salt, or more to taste

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

5 drops hot pepper sauce, such as Tabasco, or more to taste

1 cup low-fat milk

2 cups ( 1/2 pound) coarsely grated cheddar cheese

1/3 cup crème fraîche or sour cream, for garnish

About 3 tablespoons minced fresh chives, for garnish (optional)

In a large heavy-bottomed pot over medium heat, heat the butter. Add the onion and cook until it is soft and translucent, 8 to 10 minutes. Add the tomatoes, chicken stock, thyme, salt, baking soda and hot pepper sauce. Increase the heat so that the mixture comes to a boil, then stir in the milk. Reduce heat to low, cover and simmer until the mixture thickens and the tomatoes break down, 10 to 15 minutes.

Remove the pot from the heat and discard the thyme sprigs. Stir in the cheese one handful at a time, making sure it has melted before adding another handful. Using a blender, puree the soup in 2-cup batches until creamy and smooth. Transfer the soup to another large pot and keep it warm over low heat. Adjust seasoning. To serve, ladle into individual bowls and top with crème fraîche or sour cream and a sprinkling of chives, if desired.

Yield: 4 to 6 servings

Per serving (based on 6): 314 calories, 24 grams fat (15 grams saturated, 69 percent fat calories), 14 grams protein, 12 grams carbohydrates, 69 milligrams cholesterol, 2 grams dietary fiber, 861 milligrams sodium.

Lemon Marzipan Cake

Recipe Secret: To make sure that the inside of the baking pan is coated to prevent the cake from sticking, brush the inside of the pan with melted butter, then refrigerate the pan for 5 minutes so the butter will harden, enabling you to see any missed spots. Brush with more melted butter and dust immediately with flour.

Carucci, a meticulous baker, prefers using fine sea salt in this recipe because it does not contain the anti-caking ingredient found in table salt.

Serve with a raspberry coulis or fill the center of the finished cake with fresh strawberries. Also adapted from Carucci’s new book.

2 3/4 cups cake flour, sifted twice, plus additional for preparing the baking pan

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt

4 ounces almond paste

2 1/4 cups sugar

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus additional for preparing the baking pan

6 large eggs, separated

1 teaspoon vanilla extract, preferably Tahitian

1 cup low-fat sour cream

Grated zest of 2 large lemons (about 1 tablespoon)

Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees. Generously butter and flour a 10-inch Bundt pan or tube pan.

Over a sheet of waxed paper, sift together the cake flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside.

In a large bowl using an electric mixer on low speed, beat the almond paste until smooth. Add the sugar to combine thoroughly. Add the butter and beat until fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes, stopping occasionally to scrape down the bowl. Then add the egg yolks and vanilla extract until well combined.

Starting and ending with the dry ingredients, alternately add the sifted flour mixture to the batter in three increments and the sour cream in two increments, remaining on low speed and mixing well after each addition. Stir in the lemon zest, and set aside.

In another large bowl using clean beaters or the electric mixer’s whip attachment, beat the egg whites until they are stiff but not dry. Set aside.

Return the bowl of batter to the mixer, and, on low speed, add about one-third of the beaten egg whites to the batter until just combined. By hand, using a rubber spatula, gently fold the remaining egg whites into the batter.

Pour the incorporated batter into the prepared Bundt or tube pan and bake at 300 degrees for 1 to 1 1/4 hours, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean and the cake begins to pull away from the sides of the pan.

Transfer to a rack to cool, letting the cake remain in the pan for 5 minutes. Then place a rack on top of the pan and invert the cake and rack together, carefully removing the pan, and let the cake cool completely, right side up. Using a fine-mesh strainer, dust the cake with confectioners’ sugar.

Yield: 12 to 16 servings

Approximate nutrition per serving (based on 16): 372 calories, 17 grams fat, (9 grams saturated, 41 percent fat calories), 6 grams protein, 48 grams carbohydrate, 118 milligrams cholesterol, 1 gram dietary fiber, 92 milligrams sodium.