Cooking

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Spiffo needs some help with cooking...

Overview

Cooking is a skill in Project Zomboid that allows your character to make the most out of a food item when used as an ingredient.

To begin cooking, you must right-click a Cooking Pot, Frying Pan, Griddle Pan or a Bowl. If you have ingredients, you will be able to add them.

Adding 3 of the same ingredients will remove the unhappiness reduction, and will even increase unhappiness if theres more than 3.

Cooking XP is easy to gain, but you should still maximize it by reading Skill Books.

Cooking Vol. 1 (Levels 1-2)
Cooking Vol. 2 (Levels 3-4)
Cooking Vol. 3 (Levels 5-6)
Cooking Vol. 4 (Levels 7-8)
Cooking Vol. 5 (Levels 9-10)

Ways to gain XP:

Having a higher level of cooking skill provide some benefits:

Each cooking level reduces how much ingredients are used when crafting 1 dish, which helps with Hunger reduction.
- Compared to a level 0 chef, a higher level one is able to make a dish more filling, even when using the same ingredients.
  - THIS IS JUST AN EXAMPLE OF A SINGLE MUTTON CHOP ADDED INTO A STEW/SOUP! RESULTS MAY OR MAY NOT BE DIFFERENT FOR DIFFERENT INGREDIENTS

Cooking Skill	Mutton chop's hunger reduction	Stew/Soup hunger reduction(Uncooked)	Additional Hunger reduction (Uncooked)	% Increase	Stew/Soup hunger reduction(Cooked)	Additional Hunger reduction / % (Cooked)	Total % Increase
0	-30	-30	-	-	-39	-9 / +30%	+30%
10	-30	-39	-9	+30%	-50	-11 / +22%	+66.67%

Each cooking level reduces how much ingredients are used when crafting 1 dish, which indirectly increase Nutrition Values.
- Compared to a level 0 chef, a higher level one is able to squeeze more nutrients out of a food item.
  - THIS IS JUST AN EXAMPLE OF A SINGLE MUTTON CHOP ADDED INTO A STEW/SOUP! RESULTS MAY OR MAY NOT BE DIFFERENT FOR DIFFERENT INGREDIENTS

Cooking skill	Mutton Chop's Calories (Uncooked)	1st Piece of Mutton	2nd Piece of Mutton	3rd Piece of Mutton	Overall Calories	Additional calories	Total % Increase
0	234	117	117	-	234	-	+0%
5	234	132.60	132.70	35.34	300.56	76.56	+28.45%
10	234	136.5	137.5	81.9	354.9	120.9	+51.67%

At level 7 Cooking, players are able to safely use rotten food as ingredients. The amount of Hunger and Nutrients gained from rotten food is substantially reduced.
- THIS IS JUST AN EXAMPLE OF A SINGLE ROTTEN MUTTON CHOP ADDED INTO A STEW/SOUP! RESULTS MAY OR MAY NOT BE DIFFERENT FOR DIFFERENT INGREDIENTS

Cooking skill	Mutton Chop's Calories/Hunger (Rotten)	1st piece Calories	hunger reduction	% used for calories	% used for hunger reduction
7	234/-13	9.04	1	3.86%	11.54%
8	234/-13	9.09	1	3.89%	11.54%
9	234/-13	27.33	3	11.68%	23.08%
10	234/-13	27.3 (Lower than lvl 9)	3	11.67%	23.08%

At level 7 Cooking, players are able to see if food contains poison. This does not allow the player to see which mushrooms or berries are poisonous as it only displays the poisonous icon on the specific dish the poisonous item is added to, not the poisonous item itself. This also allows the player to see if bleach has been added. Each additional "dose" of poison from berry, mushroom, or bleach will lower the cooking level at which the player can recognize the food as poisoned by approximately 1.

Main article: Crafting (cooking)