One of the most overlooked, yet surprisingly useful skills in WoW is the Cooking skill.
Cooking in WoW is not an absolute must by any means, but, especially if you’ve spent some time on related secondary professions like Fishing, you can actually use Cooking to bring in a reasonable amount of gold with relatively little effort. It’s also a pretty fun diversion when you’re looking to get away from your usual activities for a little while. Initially, Cooking was largely ignored by WoW players, mainly because there wasn’t much to it. However, one of the lesser-known aspects of the Burning Crusade expansion was the attention paid to some of the secondary professions, Cooking among them, and there are now so many ways to use Cooking that it’s easy and worthwhile for anyone to give it a try.
WoW Cooking – Starting Out
The first thing you’ll need if you’d like to try Cooking is fire. In order to start a fire, you’ll have to have the Simple Wood, Flint, and Tinder items. These are very common items, as you’re probably aware. With these items on hand, go to your Spellbook. There you’ll find the Basic Campfire spell, which can be cast by anyone.
The cookbook is also located in your Spellbook. Here you’ll see which recipes you have available. One thing to keep in mind is that the Basic Campfire only lasts a few minutes. So, make sure that you’re ready to start cooking immediately after you set up your fire. To cook, select the ingredients listed in your recipe of choice.
Every recipe requires specific ingredients. We’ll use Crocolisk Steak as an example. The ingredients for Crocolisk Steak are one each of Crocolisk Meat and Mild Spices. Mild Spices are sold by many different vendors, while Crocolisk Meat is dropped by some of the various Crocolisk mobs.
By successfully completing recipes, you’ll improve your Cooking skill. You can purchase any necessary items from a Cooking trainer – you can expect to have to make a moderate investment in order to really get started. As you go forward and complete quests, though, you’ll find yourself coming across Cooking-related items on a regular basis.
Rising Through the Ranks
Finding the items necessary for advanced recipes can be a bit tricky at first. Here’s one way you can improve your Cooking skill quickly. Start off in Ironforge. You can easily get Flour and Mild Spices here, which are the ingredients for Spiced Bread. Make 60 Spiced Breads to improve your Cooking skill to 40. Next, get yourself 30 Mild Spices, and plenty of wood. Go to Auberdine, where you can find some Moonkin. Kill enough of these to get at least 20 eggs, preferably more. You can use these ingredients in recipes which will help you quickly get your Cooking skill up to 60.
From Auberdine, head south to Ashenvale, where you’ll find Crawler mobs. These will give you Clam Meat, which you can take back to Ironforge. Once you’re back, cook whatever eggs you have left and sell the finished items. After that, you can go to a cooking trainer and train your skills in order to use the Clam Meat in recipes. Your Cooking should now be around 130. Buy the Expert Cookbook, which will increase your Cooking skill cap to 225.
Making Money With Cooking
Of course, there’s more to the Cooking skill than just improving the skill itself. Food items can be useful in a number of ways, especially because of buffs. Buffs are what give food items their monetary value on the open market, and once you’ve got your Cooking skill high enough to make food with good buffs, you can start earning money by selling them.
A good Fishing skill will really help you get the most out of Cooking, but it is possible to earn decent money through Cooking even without Fishing. One popular food item is Mok’Nathal Shortribs. These will fetch about 1 gold per set. With a good source for ingredients, you can make a lot of money. Try going to the Blade’s Edge Mountains, where you can find Raptors. These mobs occasionally drop the Raptor Ribs that are the only ingredient for Mok’Nathal Shortribs. Just keep farming the Ribs here. You can get upwards of 30 Ribs, and therefore 30 gold pieces, per hour this way.
Alternatively, you might want to try selling Warp Burgers, which also go for about 1 gold. The Warp Hunters in Terrokar Forest are your source. These relatively easy mobs will drop Warped Flesh, the ingredient for Warp Burgers. This racket can net you upwards of 50 gold per hour.
You can benefit further from Cooking by being aware of the in-game seasons. During the Christmas season, for example, the market for Egg Nog heats up, due to its importance to certain quests. Egg Nog can sell for at least 1 gold, and sometimes more, around Christmas. The ingredients for Egg Nog are one each of a Small Egg, Ice Cold Milk, Holiday Spirits, and Holiday Spices. These ingredients can all be purchased individually from vendors.
Making Faster Money With Cooking
Of course, you can also skip the grinding and just purchase ingredients like Warped Flesh and Raptor Ribs from vendors. This will cut into your profit margin, but it won’t require as much time, so in the end it might be a better method for players who are pressed for time.
The Daily Quests for Cooking
Daily Cooking quests are one of the easiest ways to get huge quantities of things like fish and meat, which you can then cook and sell for major profits. Additionally, these quests will also occasionally reward you with powerful new recipes.