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There's plenty of food in Tears Of The Kingdom. Apples in the trees, fish in the ponds, mushrooms aplenty, but then there's the further task of cooking them up. Just like in the previous Zelda, you can huddle these tasty ingredients into Link's arms and chuck them into a pot.
This time around, you'll have some handy recipe books to keep track of your experiments. But that begs the question of just how exactly you earn more of these recipes and if there's a better way to avoid mistakes and waste of time.
Updated By Wyatt Grondin June 3rd, 2023: Since its release, many other ways to discover recipes have been found, aside from the original method. The original method is still the most direct path, but these other methods have been added, as well as a quick list of exact recipe guides and lists from the site.
Cooking New Recipes
The basic rules of cooking are your first step. There's even a friendly NPC named Culinary Construct you can run across who can explain it to you in detail, perfect for players who missed out on Breath Of The Wild.
Open your inventory with the Plus button on your Joycon or Pro Controller. Link can hold up to 5 ingredients at a time, and it's up to you if you are mixing and matching or just making a meal out of, say, nothing but apples. When you do this in front of a pot, you'll get a prompt to cook, where Link will chuck the armful of ingredients into the pot, and a little jingle will play as your meal is prepared. This will result in a recipe whenever you make something new.
This will also apply to food you throw over a campfire. While you can't make most dishes this way, you can fry apples and mushrooms, for example, by just dropping them at a fire and waiting for the smoke effects to finish into a finished meal. These meals, Toasty Skyshroom, for example, do count as recipes, and this is also true for food items that get frozen. So don't be afraid to look at the food that makes sense as a singular dish and throw it over a fire when the application presents itself.
Once you've used an ingredient to successfully make any recipe, you get the option to select that recipe when picking the ingredient from your inventory. This will help you keep track of what you've already concocted without needing to memorize the recipe cards.
Redoing Recipes For Better Effects
Uncooked food will have a basic effect, typically just regaining a small amount of health or stamina. Pay attention to the effects of these foods, as you can then choose to double up on something specific or try to make a more diverse dish. This is because there will be multiple versions of many recipes.
When you've done a recipe in more than one way, you'll be able to see a history of the recipe combinations with the Y button. Looking at the above picture, you can see that the mushrooms used in the dish completely changed the effect given. In the top version, Link gains 3 hearts and roughly 3/4 of the stamina gauge. But in the bottom version, only 2 and a half hearts and only about a quarter of the stamina back.
When it comes to single-item meals, you can expect the effects to stay mostly the same, as they are basic meals meant for when that's all you have. But, when you have more than enough variation for Link to hold the maximum 5, experiment with recipes you've already tried, as this will unlock more versions that may be far superior. Experimenting is the only way to learn more recipes, so try everything you can think of.
Earning Meals As Rewards
Even if Link didn't make it, earning a meal or elixir for the first time gives you the recipe. Meaning if you're given a new meal for supporting a Hudson sign or something truly unique, like purchasing Monster Stew from a side quest called The Ultimate Dish? It will earn you the recipe to recreate whenever you want. If you'd like to repeat this method, when you restore Lurelin Village, you will gain access to its restaurant, which will always reward you with a meal you've never had before.
Reading Posters
Whenever you're in a general store or a stable, look at the walls as you'll often find a poster with pictures of meals or elixirs, and the ingredients will be shown on the bottom. They are written in Hyrulian, so you only have the picture to go off of, but figuring these out will be a free recipe if you can.
A Free List Of Recipes
Whether you're looking for a specific breakdown of a meal or you'd like a full list, you can check below:
- Pizza
- Vegetable Curry
- Monster Curry
- Vegetable Risotto
- Best Elixirs
- Best Food Dishes
- Complete Recipe Guide
Again, do not be afraid to experiment after learning a recipe, as specific meal effects can sometimes still be added, and you will always remember every variation of a recipe you try.