Emmy Award-winning foodie Sam Zien, more commonly known as “Sam the Cooking Guy,” made a stop in La Jolla on Nov. 16, but the Discovery Health cooking show star didn’t cook. He did what he does best, rather — keep the crowd laughing by delving into a discussion about his life and journey to stardom. Sure, the casual cooker’s interesting recipes and how-to books have made him a household name around San Diego, but he came up with the idea of being a cooking show star, surprisingly, before he ever knew how to cook. Anyone can hit the bookstore to get a hold of his famed recipes — mashed-potato tacos, barbecue-chicken pizza and Cap’n Crunch-seared tuna, to name a few. But a better way to fill you in on his visit to the Garfield Theatre, as part of the 2010 San Diego Jewish Book Fair, would be to share the words of wisdom and lessons on life he shared last week. Who could have said it better? On being a TV show star: “Hey. It’s a big country. Somebody has to cook for it.” On growing up Jewish in Vancouver: “You don’t date Jewish girls; you marry them.” On figuring out what he wanted to do in life: “Looking through classifieds was miserable. It’s not the best way to find a career.” On drinking coffee: “I like a little bit of good coffee — espresso. It actually has less caffeine than regular coffee, because it spends less time with the beans when it brews.” On coming up with the idea of a cooking show: “I saw how the local news brought in local chefs, and thought, ‘That’s a good idea,’ but they actually made things look so complicated. I wanted to make things people could actually make at home. One problem — I didn’t cook.” On learning how to cook: “Cooking is like riding a bike. The more you do it, the better you get. That’s life. You don’t want to be there on a surgeon’s first day … If you want to get good at cooking, skip the books — get yourself a cooking show.” On punctuality: “My wife always taught me if you are on time, you’re late. You gotta be early.” On cooking with Kosher salt: “It isn’t supposed to make food salty; it’s supposed to make food taste like it should … Kosher salt has no equal. When a recipe calls for salt, they mean Kosher salt, not table salt.” On being Jewish and cooking with bacon: “If you believe in bacon, you know God made bacon … I want to believe in a God who favors a person with a good heart even if they eat bacon … What’s in your heart is more important than what’s in your stomach.” On becoming a cooking star with no experience cooking: “Don’t do what I did. Jumping off a cliff into a career you know nothing about isn’t a good idea.”