Lora Wiley has a job any food lover would envy.

Wiley, 30, is managing owner of Au Marche, 931 Mass., where she spends her days surrounded by the fruits of the world: German and Swiss chocolates, Italian sausages and prosciutto, French and Spanish cheeses, Scottish salmon and cookies from Holland, along with shelves filled with fancy oils, sauces, spreads, condiments and spices collected from here and there.

Exposure to all the foreign foodstuffs definitely plays a role in influencing Wiley’s cooking.

“My distributors send me free stuff all the time, so I can cook at home and find out what would sell in the store,” she said.

Au Marche, for instance, sells frozen duck breasts that come from Maple Leaf Farms in the Hudson Valley of New York state. Wiley has enjoyed experimenting with them in her kitchen, eventually coming up with her own recipe for Duck Breast with Port Sauce and Cherries.

“I’ve had nothing but fabulous experience with the duck breasts. The flavor is excellent, and it cooks up very nicely. Duck, by nature, is somewhat greasy, but this is not exceedingly greasy,” she said.

Wiley and Au Marche employee Tina Bell — who also has her own catering business, called Flavors — recently devised a number of recipes for Wiley to prepare along with Jayni Carey, host of Sunflower Broadband’s “Jayni’s Kitchen,” for a new installment about holiday dinners that debuted Tuesday on Channel 6.

For the program, Wiley and Bell tried to come up with recipes for dishes that would incorporate some of the products that are available at Au Marche, such as the frozen duck breasts.

“We have these Hungarian sour cherries that people usually buy as a dessert topping. I used them with the duck breasts, and they were really good,” Wiley said.

Lora Wiley, owner of Au Marche, 931 Mass., sets up a Christmas display in her store. Wiley says she likes to create recipes using ingredients that she sells at the store.

Simple but elegant

Wiley wasn’t raised with access to the fancy, imported ingredients that she savors today. Her roots in the kitchen are humble and strictly Midwestern.

“My dad grew up in central Kansas; his parents were farmers. I learned about cooking from my grandmother and my mom, but mostly I’ve taught myself. I love to read all the food magazines, like Gourmet and Bon Appetit, and try to figure out how to make the different dishes that you see,” she said.

Wiley clips out recipes that look interesting and places them in a file. When she prepares one of them, Wiley habitually writes down what she and her husband, David Wiley, liked about the dish, as well as any changes that she made to the recipe.

“I do like cooking; I’m still learning a lot. My husband lived in Sweden for a while, so I’ve been trying new Swedish recipes at home. I’ve also been trying to learn more about fish, so I’ve been making things with salmon, as well as pasta sauces from scratch. Things really do taste better if you make them yourself, rather than out of a jar,” she said.

David Wiley, 35, is program coordinator of the office of Study Abroad at Kansas University. The couple met when he came to Au Marche to do some shopping. They became engaged in Sweden and were married this past summer. Their honeymoon was in Scotland.

Lora Wiley’s appearance as a guest on the new installment of “Jayni’s Kitchen” that focuses on holiday dinners marks the third time she has been on the cooking program. On earlier shows, Wiley prepared dishes around the themes of Oktoberfest and a French holiday meal.

For the latest program, Wiley and Carey prepare three recipes for a holiday dinner: Duck with Port Sauce and Cherries; Roasted Root Vegetables with Creme Fraiche; and a Dark Chocolate and Orange Charlotte.

Creme Fraiche — pronounced “krem fresh” — is a pasteurized cream to which a lactic bacteria culture has been added. Used in French cooking, it’s thick and slightly acidic without actually being sour.

“My advice would be, if you’re having a holiday party, to do something that you personally really like and is fairly simple to prepare. The great thing about the recipes we did on ‘Jayni’ is that they are super simple, but they are also elegant,” Wiley said.

Have ingredients ready

Around the holidays, Wiley likes to contribute various dishes to family gatherings in Topeka and McPherson.

“I always help. My mom likes to do all the regular stuff. For Thanksgiving, I brought the Roasted Root Vegetables with Creme Fraiche,” she said.

When it comes to preparing dishes for holiday affairs, Wiley has learned one important lesson.

“If you decide on a Friday morning what you want to make for Friday night, make sure you have all the ingredients you need. There’s nothing more frustrating than spending half the day looking for juniper berries,” she said.

Not even the occasional setback could keep Wiley from the kitchen.

“I like cooking because it’s a creative outlet. I feel like I learn something new every time I try a recipe for the first time. And it feels good to share something I made with people that I love,” she said.