Stop Starving: The Complete Cooking Guide for Where Winds Meet

In a world full of martial arts masters and mythical beasts, your biggest enemy is usually an empty stomach or a lack of stat buffs.

I have played enough RPGs to know that "optional" cooking mechanics are rarely actually optional. Where Winds Meet is no exception. Sure, you can try to brute force your way through the game without touching a frying pan, but you are going to have a miserable time. Cooking is your primary source of healing and the only way to get those massive 30-minute stat buffs that make boss fights manageable. I dug through the menus and burnt a few roasts to compile the only list you need to keep your vitals up.

The Basics: How Not to Burn the Kitchen

Before I throw a wall of data at you, you need to understand the loop. You don't just magically conjure food. You need a recipe, the ingredients, and a heat source.

First, finding a spot. You need a fire with a pot over it. These are scattered around settlements, wilderness rest points, and camps. Walk up, interact, and the menu opens.

Here is the catch that annoyed me at first: Cooking costs Stamina. Every meal you craft drains between 2 and 8 Stamina points. You have a cap of 2,500 Stamina, and you only recover 450 a day at 5 AM. This means you cannot just stand there and craft 500 healing items in one go unless you want to be useless for the rest of the day. Plan your prep work accordingly.

The Recovery Menu (Healing)

These are your bread and butter. Recovery meals restore HP over a quick 3-second window. As you level up your cooking, the healing potency jumps massively, going from a paltry 4,500 HP all the way to 39,000 HP. Do not rely on the Level 1 stuff in the late game, you will die faster than you can chew.

RECOVERY DISHES (HEALING)

The stuff that keeps you alive when you fail to parry.

DISH NAME [LVL]	INGREDIENTS	EFFECT	HOW TO UNLOCK
Veggie Mix [1]	2 Herbs, 2 Mushrooms	Restores 4,500 HP	Available by default
Divine Stuffed Fish [1]	1 River Fish, 2 Herbs, 1 Wild Fruit	Restores 4,500 HP	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang in Verdant Wilds)
Hotpot [1]	2 Herbs, 2 Meat Scraps (Small Meat)	Restores 4,500 HP	Exploration: The Flavor of Sunset Glow
Savory Roast [20]	2 Herbs, 3 Prime Meat Cut	Restores 9,000 HP	Exploration: The Flavor of Sunset Glow
Foo Young Clams [20]	2 Eggs, 2 Meat Scraps, 1 Mushroom	Restores 9,000 HP	Exploration: The Flavor of Sunset Glow
Fish-Stuffed Lotus Pods [20]	1 River Perch, 2 Mushrooms, 2 Wild Fruits	Restores 9,000 HP	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang)
Sliced Fish Fillet [20]	2 Snakehead, 3 Herbs	Restores 9,000 HP	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang)
Steamed Pork [41]	3 Herbs, 1 Prime/Fatty Meat Cut	Restores 22,500 HP	Buy from Meow Meow Temple Shop (Kaifeng)
Wine Mushrooms [41]	3 Mushrooms, 3 Meat Scraps	Restores 22,500 HP	Buy from Meow Meow Temple Shop (Kaifeng)
Mushroom-Steamed Fish [41]	2 Luokou Croaker, 3 Mushrooms	Restores 22,500 HP	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang)
Egg Custard Soup [61]	3 Wild Fruits, 2 Eggs	Restores 39,000 HP	The Thirteenth Chambers
Mock Clam Fish [61]	2 Mandarin Fish, 2 Wild Fruits	Restores 39,000 HP	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang)
Braised Fish Head [61]	2 Bighead Carp, 3 Herbs	Restores 39,000 HP	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang)

The Buff Menu (Stats)

These meals are for when you know trouble is coming. They don't heal you instantly, but they provide 30-minute buffs to either your Max HP or your Physical Attack. Note the rules here: You can only have one food buff active at a time. If you eat a second one, it overwrites the first. Also, these buffs do not work in Trials, so don't waste your expensive Pufferfish before a trial run.

BUFF DISHES (STAT BOOSTS)

Lasts 30 minutes. Costs 8 Stamina per cook.

DISH NAME [LVL]	INGREDIENTS	EFFECT (30 MIN)	HOW TO UNLOCK
Crisp Carp Noodles [20]	1 Golden Carp, 2 Beauty's Garment, 2 Mushrooms	+1,100 Max HP	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang)
Rotisserie Venison [20]	1 Deer Meat, 2 Bai Zhu, 2 Eggs	+10–20 Physical Attack	The Thirteenth Chambers
Crispy Pheasant [41]	1 Vicious Flower, 2 Lethal Frog Meat, 2 Mushrooms	+20–40 Physical Attack	Encounter: Culinary Successor
Venison Ginseng Soup [41]	1 Venison, 2 Wild Ginseng, 3 Herbs	+2,300 Max HP	The Thirteenth Chambers
Braised Double Shreds [61]	1 Wei's Purple Peony, 1 River Fish, 2 Great Bustard Meat	+50–100 Physical Attack	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang)
Pufferfish Soup [61]	2 Jade Tower Peony, 1 Pufferfish, 2 Wild Fruits	+5,600 Max HP	Fishing Contest (Chu Shuiyang)

Finding the Ingredients

Since Amazon isn't delivering to 10th-century China, you have to get this stuff yourself.

• Hunting: Deer for venison, frogs for lethal frog meat, and random birds for bustard meat.

• Foraging: Herbs and mushrooms are everywhere. Just keep hitting the gather button while you run between quests.

• Fishing: A massive amount of high-tier recipes require specific fish like Snakehead or Pufferfish. Get used to the fishing mini-game.

• Shopping: If you are lazy (like me), you can check specialty merchants like the Meow Meow Temple Shop in Kaifeng for rarer ingredients or recipes. Yes, that is the real name.

Start leveling your cooking now, because when you are staring down a boss with 50 health left, you are going to wish you had that Pufferfish Soup.

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