This paper illustrates the relevance of contrastive rhetoric research to Translation Studies and shows how it can be applied to translation pedagogy. After a brief descriptive analysis of the recipe genre in English and Spanish, student translations are examined. It is shown that the work of novice translators is one case in which source-language textual features are transferred into the target text. The effects of explicit instruction on textual features and text-typological conventions are examined by comparing student translations: a significant improvement in the work of students exposed to explicit instruction is indicative of the benefit of pedagogical intervention. The evidence presented also indicates that translation competence is in fact separate from bilingualism.