When one bakery door closes, a book about the craft of French pastries opens.

Bold Fork Books, a new culinary bookstore, has taken over the former Pear Plum Café space in Mt. Pleasant, sating the literary appetite of restaurant industry veterans and the meal-kit beginner alike.

A cozy store that takes equal inspiration from Pinterest boards and classic libraries, Bold Fork is the product of Clementine Thomas, who has experience in the local restaurant space as the longtime co-owner of Chez Billy Sud.

Bold Fork, she says, is about sharing a “love of cookbooks with other home cooks.”

Thomas has operated an occasional pop-up in the Pear Plum Café space since last year while looking for a permanent retail space for Bold Fork. When the bakery closed in March as a non-essential business, a furloughed Thomas worked with its owners to install an expanded weekend pop-up over the summer.

And after Pear Plum’s owners decided to permanently close, Bold Fork officially took over the space in October. Pear Plum’s next-door sister market Each Peach continues to operate under pandemic restrictions, and Pear Plum’s former kitchen still supplies baked goods for the market. On a recent visit, the scent of cookies wafted through the store — “unintended but welcome,” Thomas says.

Outfitted with a library ladder to reach the top of its walnut-stained floor-to-ceiling shelves, Bold Fork’s offerings reflect the growing diversity and popularity of the cookbook genre, Thomas says. Through the shop, she hopes to have people deepen their palate as well as their understanding of D.C.

Titles focus on a range of international and cuisine-specific cookbooks, but there are also children’s books, narrative food writing, and titles focused on beer, wine, and cocktails. Food magazines round out the publications.

Because the whole shop is dedicated exclusively to food books, Thomas says, she can carry books that focus in depth on single subjects that range from cheesemaking to charcuterie and pawpaws.

To ensure a connection to the local community, Thomas, a D.C. native, wants Bold Fork to be “a resource for people in the local food community – not just in terms of the books we carry but in the kinds of events we host and advocacy we engage in.”

She plans to host author talks and other events in partnership with local restaurants when that becomes more viable.

Bold Fork also carries a collection of home goods and tools to round out shoppers’ kitchens. To drive that home, part the shop is set up in the style of a kitchen, with retro forest green cabinetry that support cascading plants alongside bowls, tea towels, and glossy food mags.

“Cookbooks have not only helped me expand my palate and repertoire, they’ve also given me more confidence and taught me things about myself along the way,” she says.

The shop’s name is derived from the title of MFK Fisher’s book “With Bold Knife and Fork.” “I just love the idea of a ‘bold fork’ — it evokes both appetite and curiosity, which is such a lovely way to think about how we approach cookbooks,” Thomas says.

As for her current favorite titles, Julia Child’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” will “always be close to my heart,” she says, also citing food writer Samin Nosrat’s runaway bestseller “Salt Fat Acid Heat” as another favorite.

Thomas is particularly excited about two new cookbooks: “In Bibi’s Kitchen” by Hawa Hassan and “Parwana” by Durkhanai Ayubi, about eastern Africa and Afghanistan, respectively. “They take such vivid, delicious dives into their respective cuisines, both of which are woefully underrepresented in the cookbook world,” she says.

Moving forward, Thomas has big plans for Bold Fork. The shop will feature book recommendations from local chefs and eventually may offer classes. The shop has collaborations with restaurant scene in the city in the works, Thomas says, and will remain closely tied to Each Peach, crafting food-and-book gift baskets for the holidays.

“Cookbooks are the one genre that hasn’t been hit as hard by large online retailers,” Thomas says. “People are still excited to get their hands on cookbooks.”