Cooking Guide

Cooking is one of WoW's "secondary" trade skills, meaning everyone can learn to cook. While you can only have two "primary" professions (like Mining, Herbalism, or Leatherworking) you can train as many secondary skills as your wish at the same time. First Aid and Fishing are the two other secondary skills.

Cooking is a profession you learn not for the amount of money that it will earn you, but for the ability to cook most of the raw meat you get on your travels by killing monsters! Most cooking recipes give the user an additional benefit for 30 minutes, improving their stats or several other aspects of their character for eating a cooked meal, as opposed to vendor food and drinks.

To become a cook, you will need to visit any of the major cities and find a cooking trainer - you will need a few silver if you want to learn cooking and the first few recipes for your level. There are more advanced cooking trainers as you progress in several outposts, as well as some recipes available from fishermen in the later towns for higher level cooking.

How to start cooking.

To start cooking, all you need to do is gather the required meat or fish your recipe asks for, and a campfire which you may start yourself, or find one in town. You may also need to find some spices, which most "General Goods" vendors carry. To make a campfire, you will need flint and tinder, as well as some simple wood. Again, you may find those at the General Goods Vendor.

A Quick Guide (2 hours) to get Cooking up to 150 may be accessed by clicking here!

Is there a complete list of items produced by Cooking?

YES! We at TenTonHammer have produced a complete list of Cooking recipes, their abilities, skill and items required to create them and much more. We maintain them in HTML format.

TenTonHammer's Reference Guide to Cooking

Level Requirements for Cooking

Where can I learn more advanced cooking?

Expert Cooking is learned from a book. Horde players should buy it from the Cooking Trainer in Shadowprey Village, Desolace, and Alliance players need to buy from the Cooking Trainer at the Alliance post near Talondeep Path in Ashenvale Forest.

Artisan Cooking is learned from Dirge Quikcleave in Gadgetzan, he's at the inn and will ask a quest of you. Before you come, if you want to save a few minutes, bring the following before taking the quest:

12 Giant Eggs (from Vultures near Gadgetzan, or Owlbeasts in Hinterlands)

10 Zesty Clam Meat (Clams in the level 40+ areas, usually from Big Mouth Clams)

20 Alterac Swiss (Vendors)

Once you accept Dirge's Quest, you can immediately turn it in so you get Artisan level cooking, and can go up to 300 in skill level!

Master Cooking is bought at the inn at Thrallmar or Honor Hold in Hellfire Peninsula, it is a book bought from the Chef at the Inn. In addition, you may also buy said book from the inn at the Cenarion Refuge in Zangarmarsh. This will allow you to reach the maximum cap of 375 for the Burning Crusade!

Are there Quests for Cooking?

There are quite a few quests for Cooking, some of which start at a very low level. They include the following:

How can I skill up past 300, recipes are too high level for me to use?

If you want to skill up past 300, you will need to complete a couple quests in Hellfire Peninsula at the wreckage to avoid needing fish to level your cooking up.

There are two ways to reach 375 cooking, either by killing monsters and using their meat, or by using fish you catch - combining both is ideal to spend the least time leveling both tradeskills. We will cover what you can cook and when below.

Monster-based drops 300-325

Buzzard Bites - requires 1 buzzard meat, will add 20 stamina and spirit for 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds.

Ravager Dog - requires 1 ravager flesh, 40 attack power and 20 spirit for 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds.

Monster-based drops 325-355

Talbuk Steak - requires 1 talbuk venison, will add 20 stamina and spirit for 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds

Roasted Clefthoof - requires 1 clefthoof meat, will add 20 strength and spirit for 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds

Warp Burger - requires 1 warp meat, will add 20 agility and spirit for 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds.

Monster-based drops 355-375

Mok'nathal Shortribs - requires 1 raptor ribs, will add 20 stamina and spirit over 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds.

Crunchy Serpent - requires 1 serpent flesh, will add 23 spell damage and 20 spirit for 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds.

Fishing-based cooking 300-340

Blackened Trout - requires 1 barbed gill trout

Fishing-based cooking 340-350

Blackened Sporefish - requires 1 zangarian sporefish, will add 20 stamina and 8 mana every 5 seconds if you eat it for 10 seconds

Fishing-based cooking 350-365

Golden Fish Sticks - requires 1 golden darter, will increase healing by 44 and spirit by 20 for 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds

Fishing-based cooking 365-375

Spicy Crawdad - requires 1 furious crawdad, will add 30 stamina and 20 spirit for 30 minutes if you eat it for 10 seconds.

Where can I contribute to this guide?

You can visit our forums and post comments on this or any other guide. To post comments on this guide, please go to our Trade skill forum, located here. Thanks for reading!