Hanging out in Darin Sehnert’s kitchen feels as comfy as leaning on the counter at family gatherings.

Difference is he’s a highly trained chef running a cooking school in Savannah, and he knows a whole lot about putting food and conversation together.

After taking his low country class in February I know more than I used to, but not so much that my vacation-to-relax was interrupted by too much paying attention.

Good combination.

That “Aw shucks, now I remember what I forgot at the grocery store” feeling changes from troubling to piece of cake because Chef Darin’s class in a fabulous hotel is all about knowing how things work and what to substitute.

“Chefs don’t make mistakes,” he told me watching my clumsy cutting techniques. “They just create new dishes.”

Excellent concept for my at-home kitchen.

And here’s another notion I embraced at the 700 Kitchen Cooking School attached to a bold, beautiful new hotel named the Mansion on Forsyth Park. This idea just might help me eliminate jumbled piles of dog-eared recipes torn from magazines and newspapers.

“A group of ingredients paired with a group of techniques,” Chef Darin says, “is a recipe.”

So with a few more classes, maybe I can cook out of my head instead of wondering where I might have put a recipe I clipped. I kept Chef’s business card with one hole punch where there used to be a drawing of a chef’s tall hat. Four more punches and I get a free class.

Low country cuisine was the three-hour focus traveling partner G.W. Tibbetts and I signed up for. We know how to do the big pot of sausage, corn, shrimp and sometimes potatoes called a low country boil, but we wanted to know more.

“The single most important influence on this good food was the people of West Africa,” Chef Darin tells the class right after we don our aprons.

“Long slow simmering over a fire was necessary for them because they had so many jobs to do, and such long days of hard work.”

Fixing grits? “Cook them very slowly over low heat for an extended period of time,” he says. “The other secret to flavorful creamy grits is to use a combination of chicken stock and milk, much better than water alone.”

We learned how to fix black-eyed pea salad, and guess what? Chef says it’s best made a day in advance so the flavors can marry. Dijon mustard, dried oregano, grape tomatoes, fresh basil, kosher salt and red wine vinegar are part of the marrying with the peas, red onion, celery and green pepper.