In this guide, you’ll learn how to cook all kinds of different recipes in Zelda: TOTK for health, stamina, weather, and more.
Cooking carries over from the previous game, Breath of the Wild (BOTW). Like before, Link must gather various ingredients to place into a heated pot to cook delicious meals. These meals serve numerous purposes, including restoring health, stamina, and more.
How to Cook in Zelda: TOTK
1. Start a Fire or Get a Pot
Before you even begin to cook in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, you need either a fire or an ignited pot.
If you’re out in the open world, you must either stumble upon a fire or pot or make one yourself.
- Read more: Zelda TOTK: How to Shield Surf
To make a Fire, equip a Flint and a piece of Wood, then drop them on the ground. Be sure it isn’t raining, then strike the Flint with your melee weapon. It will ignite the fire, and you can throw ingredients on top of it to cook with.
Many cooking pots exist in the open world, but you use a Zonai Portable Pot. Using a pot you found is best because the Zonai Portable Pot only works once.
2. Collect ingredients
Ingredients for cooking can be found everywhere in your journey through the game. Apples grow on trees, mushrooms grow in caves, and hunting wildlife with a bow and arrow helps you gather meat, for example.
Open the Materials tab in your inventory by pressing the ‘+’ button. Then hover over the ingredient you’d like to add to the pot. Select the ‘Hold’ option, and you can grip up to five ingredients simultaneously.
After holding the ingredients, you need to cook with, press B to exit the menu. Then, stand near your cooking pot or fire and press A to drop the ingredients.
Why You Need To Cook
No matter how quick on your legs you are at dodging and blocking, Link will inevitably take a major hit or two after a while. More than anything, eating food restores health quickly and can be done while in the middle of combat.
However, different meals offer different benefits that extend beyond restoring health. Some restore stamina, and others grant cold resistance, etc.
How to Learn Recipes
In Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, there are 200+ recipes to learn and cook. After successfully making a meal with a particular ingredient the first time, it will be added to your list of reusable recipes.
The easiest recipes to learn are by cooking exclusively with the same ingredient. For example, you can easily make a fruit dish using a handful of Apples (3-5).
By constantly experimenting with different combinations and quantities of ingredients, Link will learn more and more recipes.
There are also tons of recipe posters on the walls of shops and stables you will encounter on your journey as well, which show off dishes and ingredients. Take note in order to follow the recipe.
Once an ingredient has been used in a successful meal, the recipe is saved and accessible from the Materials submenu. Hover over an ingredient, and look for the option that says ‘Select for recipe’ and you will see the list of recipes you’ve unlocked which require that ingredient. Press ‘A’ to hold the necessary ingredients, and you’ll be instantly ready to cook.
Status Effect Ingredients
If you’re looking for a specific status effect with your meal recipe, check the following names to indicate the intended outcome when eaten:
- Dark – Resistance to Gloom
- Electro – Resistance to Shock
- Enduring – Increases Stamina
- Energizing – Restores Stamina
- Fireproof – Resistance to Fire
- Hasty – Increases Speed
- Hearty – Extra Hearts (up to 5)
- Icy/Chilly – Resistance to Heat
- Mighty – Increased Attack
- Sneaky – Increased Stealth
- Spicy – Resistance to Cold
- Sticky – Increased Grip
- Sunny – Heals damage from Gloom
- Tough – Increased Defense
