Most efficient desert food?

[Panfilo]

I had my guys subsist on dried meat scavenged from dead skimmers, but as I built up my base I've gotten curious about other foods.

Dustwich, for example, has a ton of steps to go from raw material to Dustwich. Are they worth making?

[Hobo Misanthropus]

Multi-step food is worth making if you have a good assembly line for it.

Recruit Jewel, she starts off (And as far as I know, is unique in this regard) with 40 cooking.

To get a good consistent flow of materials and labor, you'll need at least 3 people, 1 dedicated Farmer, 1 dedicated cooker, and one person who can handle misc tasks as necessary, be it hauling in crops or grinding wheat (unless you have auto grind researched)

[Tommygun]

The most efficient is to keep it simple. Just go with Chewsticks for daily food.
Then maybe buy ration backs for exploring if you need the room in your inventory.

[Hobo Misanthropus]

Originally posted by Tommygun:

The most efficient is to keep it simple. Just go with Chewsticks for daily food.
Then maybe buy ration backs for exploring if you need the room in your inventory.

Chewsticks are literally the opposite of effecient. Considering bread is baked automatically, there is literally no reason to make Chewsticks when you have the infrastructure to make Dustwich.

buying Ration packs is always a good idea though, so I won't knock you there, but sustaining yourself on ration packs isn't viable early game without exploits or trashing your rep with the trader's guild by ransacking their caravans (Which is excellent if you're planning on siding with the Anti-Slavers)

If you do want to raid caravans, you need at least one good runner, and the ability to take down 2 adult Garru with the rest of your squad. You don't need to fight the whole caravan, have your runner drag the guards away and your fighters draw in the Gars, the further away your runner can get from your fighters, the better just to avoid getting rekt by the whole crew.