It has been my experience after playing two characters in this game, that one of the main mechanisms to learning a new recipe is the act of interacting with the ingredients of the recipe. After cutting down my first pine tree then looting the core wood material, I learned most of the construction recipes that use core wood. After mining my first silver vein, I learned nearly all the recipes that use silver as a reagent in their production. There is a caveat to this mechanism insomuch as the player in most cases must have the appropriate level of crafting bench, cauldron, cooking station or artisan bench required to make the recipe ...