In Monster Hunter Wilds, cooking meals and grilling meat are essential survival skills that provide buffs, restore stamina, and enhance your hunting efficiency. Whether you’re using the base camp facilities or grilling in the field, mastering the cooking mechanics ensures you’re always prepared for battle. This guide will walk you through everything you need to know about preparing meals effectively.
Food Types in Monster Hunter Wilds
The simplest recipes in Monster Hunter Wilds require only Rations. These can be regularly obtained from the Support Desk NPC at a base by selecting the Ingredient Center option. Over time, additional ingredients can be included to enhance buffs by choosing the Custom Meal option before cooking. Rations provide the following base effects:
- Meat: +50 health, +150 stamina, +2 attack.
- Fish: +50 health, +150 stamina, +4 defense.
- Veggies: +50 health, +150 stamina, +2 defense, +3 elemental resistance.
Meals made exclusively with Rations have a buff duration of 30 minutes.
Additional Ingredients and Finishing Touches
Adding extra ingredients to a meal enhances its effects and extends the buff duration by 20 minutes. Kunafa Cheese, used in the Defender Meal, sometimes reduces damage taken. Droolshroom, found in the Black Belt Meal, decreases stamina depletion when performing stamina-draining moves like dodging. Mud Shrimp, included in the Tumbler Meal, slightly extends the invulnerability period while dodging. Fluffy Egg, part of the Caprice Meal, provides a temporary attack boost at random intervals. Sild Garlic, used in the Moxie Meal, prevents fainting once when damage taken exceeds the remaining health.
For finishing touches, Wild Herb is used in the Immunizer Meal which reduces the effects of various ailments. Similarly, Eastern Honey, found in the Medic Meal, enhances health recovery when healing.
Note: The timer pauses inside base camp, allowing strategic use of meal buffs.
How to Cook Meals in Monster Hunter Wilds
In Monster Hunter Wilds, there are multiple ways to prepare and cook meals:
- Cooking a meal inside your tent at base camp or in Pop-up Camps.
- Using the portable BBQ grill to prepare a meal.
- Grilling Raw Meat on the portable BBQ grill to make steaks.
Note: The last option mainly helps restore health and stamina if your food buff wears off during a fight. However, the first two methods are the most important for meal preparation.
Cooking a meal from a tent or a portable BBQ grill provides the same benefits, allowing hunters to choose the most convenient option. Eating at the tent before departing on a quest is ideal, while the portable grill is useful for those moments when a meal is forgotten mid-hunt.
Regardless of the cooking method, there are three meal options:
- Recommended Meal: Automatically selects ingredients for optimal benefits.
- Custom Meal: Allows full control over ingredients and status effects.
- Favorite Meals: Saves preferred meals for quick access.
Each meal consists of up to three ingredient types: Rations, Additional Ingredients, and Finishing Touches. Hunters can either let the game choose ingredients or customize meals manually.
How to Grill Meat in Monster Hunter Wilds
Cooking a meal with a meat ration is different from grilling meat. When raw meat is grilled, it transforms into a new consumable item—rare steak, well-done steak, or burnt meat, depending on the timing.
Grilling meat cannot be done inside a tent; it must be performed outdoors, even just outside the tent at a camp. Before grilling, raw meat must be available in the item pouch.
Selecting the Grill Meat option initiates a minigame. The character waves the meat over the grill, and pressing the X/A button at the right moment determines the outcome:
- Pressing too early results in nothing or a mix of raw and well-done steaks.
- Pressing slightly early yields a few raw steaks along with well-done steaks.
- Timing it correctly produces six well-done steaks per raw meat.
- Pressing too late results in a mix of well-done steaks and burnt meat.
To achieve perfect timing, watch the meat closely. When the character flips it, the texture will change shortly after—press the button as soon as this change occurs to consistently get six well-done steaks.
A second stage of the minigame follows, where the character cuts up the well-done steaks. Pressing X/A in rhythm with the cuts and music increases the yield, with perfect timing granting up to 12 steaks.
The different steaks and burnt meat become consumable items stored in the item pouch: Rare steak restores health and stamina while temporarily increasing max health, well-done steak restores health and stamina while replenishing both gauges, and burnt meat only restores stamina.
