Monster Menu: The Scavenger’s Cookbookimmediately tells you thatcrafting and cooking are the game’s biggest draws. It’s dangerous to try and manage your way through without eating, maybe even impossible. So much so that you can watch your energy and hydration go down in real-time, leaving you vulnerable to being knocked out quickly.
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So, it’s best to take full advantage of your deluxe outdoor kitchen and make the best dishes with what you have. Whether that be the finest rice or the hay, you’ll find lying on the ground. But, if you are still deciding which recipes are worth your time, let this list offer suggestions from its menu that will help you on your journey.
10Dirt Poor Dish
There’s little benefit from eating a Dirt Poor Dish in the game. Still, at the beginning of the game, it’s one of the few recipes you start out with,indicative of your less-than-ideal cooking skills. Sure, it doesn’t taste good, and you will be unhappier after you eat it. Still, since you’re starving in some dangerous woods, anything is better than nothing.
The best part is all it takes are some simple ingredients literally lying around! So grab yourself some hay, rocks, and maybe some innards, and you’ll have a recipe that will give you some calories and hydration points to get you to the next rest area. The only thing it will cost is your happiness, but who needs that when you have a full stomach?
9Raw Veggies
After exploring the dungeon and gaining more ingredients, you may start making food that will not only replenish your HP and calories but also be a net positive for all your stats, including your happiness meter. While the happiness meter seems not consequential, if it runs empty, that party member will suffer some adverse effects.
Not only that, it’s the first recipe you receive that tremendously helps you quench your thirst and keep you hydratedwhile looking delicious. This makes it a must-have since every move and action you take in both battle and in the dungeon drains your hydration.
8Rice And Meat
On the flip side, if you want something that fills your caloric intake and keeps you full forat least a few dungeon floors, then the classic rice and meat will do the job. The recipe gives you a 40 percent calorie recovery but doesn’t offer much in the way of hydration.
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Though the ingredients are simple to grab, you’ll need a lot of meat (or innards, if you prefer) to properly make the dish. However, this bowl full of love and meat will also significantly fill your happiness meter, leaving you with renewed determination to either make it the next couple of floors or provide you with a much-needed buff before a difficult boss.
7Grilled Meat
This is a straightforward recipe you’ll learn early on since it requires simple ingredients. Grilled meat is as simple as it gets: you grab some meat from your conquests in battle, cut it up, and place it over a roasted fire. There’s nothing better than cooking and eating fresh meat outdoors.
Who wouldn’t be happy with a belly full of well-seasoned meat? Though some of the sources you collect your slabs from are… less than ideal, you don’t have much choice if you want to survive. Hunger is the best spice, after all. That and the desperation of wanting to get out of that cursed forest.
6Stir Fry Bugs
This meal is not for the squeamish, but you’ll need all the protein you’re able to get, so you and your party members will have to put that disgust aside andchow down on some bugs. The ingredients are more plentiful than the meat, innards, and veggies you’re used to. You’ll have to dig into the earth for these (metaphorically, of course) succulent creepy crawlies.
Though you get all your standard stats boosted and some calories to burn from it, your party could be happier eating the little grubs. That’s understandable, but you’d think after surviving off the land for so long, they’d acquire a taste for the outside-the-box ingredients by now.
5Larvashroom Pasta
Guess all that bug-eating finally starts to rub off with this entry.Despite worms being the main ingredient in this pasta dish,you and your party are safe from losing happiness with this dish. Of course, it could be that the worms blend in with the texture of the pasta, but that seems like a stretch.
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Still, it’s good to know that your survival prowess and culinary skills are starting to pay off in taste and efficiency, right? Once you eat it, you’ll be granted a mysterious power. What is that power? Well, you will have to take your chances to find out.
4Mt. Fried Rice
Fried rice is one of the greatest culinary inventions known to man. you’re able to take any ingredient, seasonings, and sauce to fry with rice, and you’re bound to have a good meal. It’s versatile and filling to give you plenty of energy throughout your day. However, the fried rice in Monster Menu has a little secret hiding inside.
What does that mean? Some meals come with hidden and not-so-hidden perks that can do various things. From boosting your defense and attack to giving you some secret bonus, you’ll only know once you’ve eaten it. The Mt. Fried Rice? Well, naturally, it gives you the power of fire. That’s right, once you eat it, your attacks have added elemental fire. Pretty nice.
3Meat Bun
Meat and sauce rolled up inside freshly made bread? There isn’t much better than that. Low on hydration but high in HP, calories, and happiness, the meat bun is the quintessential food to carry with you on the go while you’re slaying monsters or, more importantly, trying to avoid death while finding the exit.
This makes the meat bun an even better fit because once you eat it, it grants you an evasion boost to carry with you into battle, which helps boost your ability to avoid taking damage for a limited time. But, of course, it’d be golden if only you could have these passive benefits in real life.
2Snow Cone
After a long day of adventuring, surviving, and maybe dying a few times, you’ll need something to lift your spirits. Enter the Snow Cone; cool and sweet, it does an adequate job relaxing your party after a long fight, and it is a technical marvel that you may make ice out of the water without refrigeration.
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While it doesn’t have much in the way of HP regeneration or calories, you’ll gain the benefits of abundant hydration and a maximum happiness percentage to boost your party’s morale. If only it came in multiple flavors.
1Devouring Monsters
While it’s great that you have many options to choose from as to what will fulfill your culinary needs, you could always cut out the middle process of preparing and cooking the ingredients and eat your meal in a more animalistic capacity. What does that mean, exactly?
Well, if you are famished while in battle, all you have to do is beat up your ingredients, and when they’re dead on the ground, just eat them. Yep, straight off the field! You’ll regain a considerable chunk of HP and calories in the process, plus that leaves you with a lot less prep in between floors if you time your meal right. It’s a win-win for everyone! Well, perhaps not for the monster you’ve eaten. But they’re dead, so who cares?
