DAVIS COUNTY — A lot of cookbooks presume the reader already knows certain basic things, such as what it means when it tells you to “simmer” or how precisely a person goes about “basting” something.

“The First Timer’s Cookbook,” however, does not. Written by chef Shawn Butler, this book goes through everything from setting a table to the best way to store asparagus. As such, the book veers between “Doesn’t everyone know that?” to “I always wished someone had told me that,” with the boundaries for each depending on the individual reader’s experience with the kitchen and things in it.

The most useful parts of the book are the pages where it explains terms that most cooks take for granted, such as describing “boiling,” “simmering” and “poaching” by the different ways the bubbles look (in the third one, for example, the water gets hot but doesn’t bubble). Another section lists the internal temperatures of different types of meat when they’re “rare,” “medium rare,” and “well done,” as well as less concrete touch methods that explain how to tell for each.

Though the above information has likely been picked up on a trial-and-error basis by anyone who’s ever tackled preparing a full-on dinner for their family, it offers comforting instruction for anyone whose cooking experience ends at homemade cookies.

Even for those people, however, there will be bits that make them roll their eyes. A list of suggested baked potato toppings will offer no surprises for anyone who’s ever been within 50 feet of a baked potato bar, and other people might chuckle at the detailed pictures the book requires for the simple act of chopping.

Overall, however, the book ends up offering far more genuine good advice than it does unintended entertainment. Though experience works just as well, “The First Timer’s Cookbook” is a nice security blanket for those first steps into the kitchen.