The Don't Starve Food Guide

As of now, this guide is over 3 months outdated and I sadly do not intend to update it unkess I got a lot of encouragement. I am sorry.

A simple guide meant to help newer players find ways to get food, the stats of the food, how to use the food, and some tricks.

Thank you all for getting this so popular. I give credit to:

Google images: For the images, silly.
Don't Starve wiki: For exact food stats and some recipes
My expirience: For testing some of these facts and finding situations for these.

I'm working on a survival guide right now. I'll link it here when I am done with it.

Naturally growing foods

The basic two harvestable foods are carrots and berries. Berries are abundant and re-grow every 5 or so in-game days. Berries can be found all over the world on, well, berry bushes. Be careful harvesting berry bushes, as there is a chance that it will spawn a gobbler. Gobblers eat your berries off their bushes so either kill them or chase them away as soon as possible. Gobblers are a food source, but we'll get to that later. Berry bushes can be collected using a shovel and planted. But you will need manure in order to make them start to grow berries. Berries are great early on too because they heal a fair amount of hunger and cooked ones restore a bit of health. But they expire fast, especially cooked ones. If you are planning to mainly use raw berries, then I advice to have as many as you can hold as they have a 6 day expiration date. Try to keep around 20 if you are using raw berries. Now, cooked berries? You should try to maintain 10 or so cooked berries because of the halved expiration date.

Carrots are another basic harvestable. Carrots spawn naturally in the world, just like berries. Unlike berries, carrots are somewhat limited as the only way to make more carrots is to be lucky with farms. Carrots heal more hunger then berries. Carrots go stale signifigantly slower too. Carrots are overall better, but as mentioned earlier, they are limited. Carrots lure bunnies whether in traps or simply left on the ground. Also, it's worth mentioning that carrots, if fed to a bird in a birdcage, produce carrot seeds so you have a 100% chance to get some carrots. Cooking a carrot provides you with roasted carrots, which heals more health.

There is also the mushrooms. Mushrooms are randomly generated just as carrots and berries. But mushrooms can only be picked at certain times of day. There are 3 kinds of mushrooms. Red during the day, Green during dusk, and blue during night. Red mushrooms do 20 damage to you and heal you 12 hunger. The green heals 12 hunger too, but with the biggest possible impact on your sanity of any food in the game with taking your sanity down by 50. Only eat this if you want to see beardlings or hallucinations. The blue mushroom heals you 20 health, 12 hunger just like the rest, but does 15 damage to your sanity. Eating mushrooms is not advised.
The last food that exists naturally is quite possibly the most abundant - petals. Petals are common as they seem to have a high spawn rate. Especially so in grasslands. But petals do not heal hunger, rather they heal 1 health upon being eaten. Sounds near useless, doesn't it? Actually, it's an amazing item for healing sanity. As they are abundant and picking them heals 5 sanity. Petals can be used as a fuel source too which is probably a better use. It's worth mentioning that petals can also be used to craft a garland. The garland heals your sanity slowly. It takes 12 petals, which harvesting would heal a full 60 sanity. The garland heals sanity very slowly and like the ham bat (info on that at the end of the meat section) it doubles as a food. The garland expires and eating it only heals 3 HP though. Can only be useful right before the garland expires.

Meats

Before we discuss meats, take note that eating all kinds of meat downs your sanity. And be careful killing most of these creatures that are passive because they up your naughtiness which will make krampus arrive. There is also jerky, which is a lot more potent then normal meats. To make jerky, put any kind of meat on a drying rack. It drastically slows down the expiration date.

Morsel is the basic kind of meat. Collected from killing a bunny, gobbler, or a redbird.. It's the easiest to get from killing bunnies as you could just put some berries or carrots, even if it is expired, in a trap and wait for a nearby bunny to get caught in it. When caught, the bunny becomes an item. It doesn't stack though so keep that in mind. It NEVER expires so you are safe to make chests for keeping bunnies in just in case. When you have the bunny item, you can right mouse click on them to murder them. They turn into morsel (which stacks). Morsel is good for being abundant, but it can take lots of resources in order to capture a lot of bunnies. But it downs your sanity no matter what so be careful when eating a lot of morsel, maybe keep a tent around or a garland equipped to make the downsides feel like near nothing. At low sanity, bunnies become bearlings and morsel becomes monster meat or nightmare fuel or beard hair, so the sanity lowering effect can hinder your access to morsel, even if you caught some and put them in a chest they'll still become beardlings. Also, you can make a bird trap to catch redbirds. They only have a chance to drop morsel though, unlike bunnies where they always yield morsel unless they are beardlings.

This next kind of meat is simply named Meat. Meat is dropped by pigs, tallbirds, beefalo, koelaphants, deerclops, mactusk, and weetusk. It's harder to get then say, morsel or carrots. But it heals a full 25 hunger and most all enemies that drop it usually drop multiple. Cooking it makes it heal more health. It takes a full 6 days for the raw meat to expire and a full 10 for the cooked meat to expire. Cooking it removes the sanity loss, unlike morsel.

Drumsticks are the next kind of meat. Drumsticks are dropped by gobblers, which randomly spawn when a berry bush is harvested, even one you yourself planted. Drumsticks have virtually identicle stats to morsel. So there isn't much else to say.

The next is a very rare one. Koalefant trunks. Koalefants rarely want to show up, and when they do, they can put up quite a fight. I think recent updates made them a ton more common though. If you want to fight koalefants, bring any ranged weapon. They are pretty potent at healing health and hunger with over 30 points in both. Cooking a trunk turns it into a trunk steak. Healing 75 hunger and 40 health. It also takes over twice as long to expire. You can use them and some silk to craft a breezy vest. Which keeps you warm in the winter. There are also winter koalefant trunks which can be used to make an even more potent vest.

Next, we have monster meat. Monster meat is dropped by hounds, spiders, beardlings, krampus, and tentacles. Monster meat heals 20 hunger but does massive damage to both health and sanity. Not recromended to eat unless you have few other food sources. Monster meat can be used in conjunction with spider glands, which will heal you, but it seems a waste of precious abillities to heal yourself. It's worth noting that if you feed a pig or it eats 4 monster meats, it will transform into a werepig. Cooking monster meat only reduces the health and sanity loss. It reduces how much hunger it heals though, but only by 1 point, so you shouldn't mind it that much.

The last two - Frog legs and fish. First, we'll go over frog legs.
Frog legs is dropped by frogs and merms. Frogs are found near ponds and merms are found in swamplands. Frog legs also has virtually identicle stats to morsel.
Fish is dropped by Merms. It is also yielded if you fish in a pond. Unlike all other meats, this one does not have any sanity loss. Fish expires quickly though so try to use it up fast. Fish heals the same amount of hunger as morsel.

That's not all though. There is one last kind of meat to touch on, but could it be considered meat? It doubles as a food and weapon and it's the ham bat. The ham bat is basically an edible spear. It deals the same damage as the spear and it can be eaten. Crafted with a pigskin, 2 sticks, and 2 pieces of meat. It only heals 25 hunger and damages sanity and health. The ham bat, if you take it seriously, is the 4th best melee weapon in the game. Beaten easily by the spear, tentacle spike, and dark sword. It's only better then all the tools that come prior. It is also worth mentioning that one of the two TF2 promos this game had was modeled after this. Namely the ham shank.

Phew, this was a big section. I might try to get images for this section. Meat foods are common, but with their sanity loss, it can be risky. Especialy with how a lot of these enemies you need to kill to get meat have an insanity aura.

Farm foods

This'll definately be the shortest section because there isn't as much to say about farmland foods. Farmland grows food when you plant seeds. You speed up this very slow process by fertilizing it via manure. All of these foods can be fed to a bird in a birdcage for seeds that have a 100% chance to produce that kind of food, so feeding the bird a carrot will yield carrot seeds, and so forth.
Here's farmland percentages

Corn (32%)
Carrots (32%)
Pumpkins (11%)
Eggplant (11%)
Pomegranate (5%)
Durian (5%)
Dragonfruit (5%)

-Don't starve wiki

The first farmland food is the most important for creating farmland foods. It is the seeds of course. Seeds can be consumed for 4 hunger. They are very weak and cooking them makes no difference. There is a chance of seeds spawning when a bird lands. If you don't make it flee, it will eat the seeds up. Seeds can be planted into farmlands. It will eventually grow into one of all these foods listed below.

Corn is a potent food, healing just as much health as cooked Meat. It's got a fair expiration date of 9 days too. Cooking it makes it into popcorn which is overall weaker but adds 6 days to the expiration date.

Carrots, you know about already if you read the first section, second paragraph. So I don't need anything on this.

Pumpkins are very potent foods, healing up to 37 hunger, being one of the most potent foods in the game. Cooking it only adds 5 health to it. It's also got the expiration date of 10 days raw. It makes amazing emergency food in case you are very low on hunger. The health the cooked edition gives can make it even better. If you craft a pumpkin with fireflies, you get a Jack 'o lantern.

Eggplants seem to have identicle stats to cooked meat raw (without the sanity loss). When cooked, the eggplant becomes another great emergency food. Giving 20 full health when cooked.

Pomegranate, at first look, is near identicle to a berry, just healing 2 more HP. When cooked though, it becomes yet another good emergency food, but only health-wise. Healing 20 HP and having identicle hunger healing to morsel when cooked.

Durian hurts you and your sanity initially but gives you 25 hunger. When cooked, it removes the health loss. Durian is not worth it because even corn is better. You'll have to be unlucky to find durian. While it can be good, it's just not common enough for those stats.

Dragon fruit is the last food in this section. Having identicle stats to the pomegranate raw and expiring even faster. When cooked, dragon fruit is also identicle to the pomegranate, and expiring in 3 full days. It heals 20 HP still, so it can be useful, but you don't have much time to find a proper situation where this will save you, unlike the pumpkin or pomegranate.

That's all for section 3. There isn't much to say about these. Just remember that you have pretty bad luck if you find durian.

Non-expiring foods

Non-expiring foods, you heard right. While there, right now, is only 3 non-expiring foods that I can recall, I thought a section on this was worthy.
Mandrake is the first of the three. Mandrake is by far one of the best, if not the best food in the game. Spawning incredibly rarely and only so many spawning in one world. As the name of this section should imply, it never expires. Even cooked mandrake doesn't expire. You can make mandrake stew which expires though. Mandrake are like carrots as they only spawn in the ground. If you've harvested mandrake before or seen it harvested, you'll see that Wilson doesn't pick it up, rather he pulls it up and it stands up on the ground. If you harvested it at dusk or night, it will follow you. Enemies like spiders will attack it if it gets in their way or too close. Mandrake heals a full 60 health and 75 hunger, but with no sanity gain or loss. You can cook mandrakes. Cooking a mandrake will make you pass out until the next section of the day which can be risky if you do it at dusk as you'll wake up at night. Atleast your fire does not burn out. Cooked mandrake heals you 100 health and 150 hunger. It can be a lifesaver and it can be in particular helpful as wolfgang as he is more combat/tank based. Eating cooked mandrake will make you and all mobs around you pass out. Waking up later. There is no way to make finding mandrake easier with the exception of good luck and a sence of exploration.

The second one is the Deerclops Eyeball. The deerclops is pretty much a no-brainer. It's a deer and a cyclops. You'll be wandering through the winter and suddenly one spawns and deals massive damage to you by ambushing you. The deerclops only spawns during the winter and he will despawn when summer arrives. Him approaching is like the hounds approaching, for a minute you'll hear some noises. Eventually it will come out and chase you down. The deerclops has the massive amount of 2000 health. Only barely being beaten by the hardest kind of treegaurd. The deerclops eyeball is not nearly as good as mandrake though and it should be better considering finding mandrake is easier then finding and defeating the deerclops considering the deerclop's health. You might be waiting for stats, well, here they are. It heals 60 health and 75 hunger, but it hurts you sanity by 15 points. Keep in mind that mandrake is better - a lot better.

The third and presumably last is the tallbird egg. The tallbird egg is the least potent of the three. The tallbird egg can be found in tallbird nests. The tallbird egg heals 3 health and 25 hunger. It can be cooked unlike the deerclops eye. Cooking it basically removes the health bonus and turns it into a 12 point bonus towards hunger. Overall reaching 37 hunger healed. It can be good for food, but eating it is only advised if you need a food source - badly. Cooking it makes it expire in 6 days, unlike mandrake where it still never expires. The other thing you can do with the tallbird egg that makes it unique and stand out is that it will hatch eventually. Place it next to a fire and it will eventually become a hatching tallbird egg. It hatching will take roughly 3 in-game days. When it hatches, it will have become a smallbird. These cute little guys will follow you around and try to help fight, but they have little health. Unlike adult tallbirds, smallbirds yield morsel. Smallbirds will demand food and will peck the player for food. They only take raw berries and seeds. Killing a smallbird is a very naughty action, adding 6 to your naughtiness. They later turn into smallish tallbirds which stil follow you and are far better for combat. Then they will become a regular tallbird and become hostile if you get too close.

There are the game's non-expiring foods. All being difficult to get or find. The rarity of these mainly comes from either being lucky enough to stumble on a source or whatever drops these. So try to take advantage of opprotunities to get these (unless you find a deerclops on like, day 7).

Crock pot

I finally got around to doing this. I'll add images soon enough. The crock pot is made with 3 stone, 6 charcole, and 6 sticks. The crock pot allows you to make better and special kinds of food. Some very potent foods are made in a crock pot. I'm also going to try to get every crock-pot recipe. So this is going to be very long.

First one is the first full of jam. The first full of jam can be made with 4 berries in a crock pot. It's a lot more potent then 4 berries seperately and has 15 days before it expires. It gives sanity and health too. This item is pretty good resource-wise. It's just as good as a pumpkin and it's worth the 4 berries.

Honey ham is the second one. Honey ham needs 2 or more meats, honey, and the last slot can be anything other than sticks. Honey ham fills a full 30 health and 75 hunger and has a 15 day expiration date. Yet another good emergency food. It's one of the better items made in the crock-pot but it can be difficult to get. Honey is tough to get early on and so is meat.

Mandrake soup is next, I mentioned this earlier. 100 health and 150 hunger. Same stats as the normal cooked mandrake. This can be crafted with a mandrake and 3 sticks. Mandrake must be raw otherwise you'll waste a mandrake. It heals 5 sanity, which normal mandrake doesn't. This may not sound like it is worth it, especially with it expiring. But it deletes the time-change cooked mandrake has. Which can be an advantage, but very rarely.

That's it for this section. But I'm still working on it. I wanted to get some basic recipes out of the way before I finish this section up.

Other foods

When I finish this section, I'm going to add a crock pot section. I'm going to work on these 2 sections for my free time.

"Other foods" are basically the foods that really don't fit in any of these sections. They don't fit in meat, they don't fit in non-expiring, so what do they fit in? The other foods section, of course.

The first is the egg. The egg is yielded when feeding any meat except monster meat to a bird in a birdcage. Fairly late-game, yes? The egg only heals 9 hunger. Which most meats heal more than. But it has no sanity or health loss or gain, unlike meats. Cooking it turns it into a cooked egg and it is just as potent as morsel with no sanity loss. Eggs can be gived to the pig king in exchange for gold nuggets. If you let it expire, it becomes a rotten egg which hurts you in everything. It never spoils, but it technically isn't a food. Crafting it with charcole and nitre turns it into gunpowder which does massive explosive damage.

The second one is honey. Honey is yielded from bees on death usually. But you can also find it by harvesting a bee box or destroying a bee hive, all making bees hostile towards you. Honey is kind of rare so eating honey isn't advised as much. Rather you should take the honey and craft it with papyrus to make honey poultice. Honey poultice heals a full 30 health compared to the raw honey, which heals only 3 health. Honey only heals 9 hunger too. Although the hunger bonus is removed from honey poultice, honey poultice is a healing item. If you want to gather honey, you must, simply must, wear a beekeeper's helmet. It blocks a lot of incoming damage bees do to you. Wearing it with log armor can make you near invincible to bees. Honey also takes a full 40 days to expire, which is a long time.

The third is butter. Butter can be yielded by butterflies with only a 2% chance of dropping. Butter heals 40 health and 25 hunger and has a 40 day long expiration date. Butter is potent but incredibly rare as it isn't very often when you will kill a butterfly. Be careful trying to kill butterflies for butter as every butterfly kill adds 1 point to your naughtiness. Butterflies also drop butterfly wings, which heals 8 health.

That's it for this section. These where simply those foods that really don't belong in any other catagory. Butterfly wings are not meat as they aren't usable in place of meat in a crockpot.

Tips and tricks

I'll add more to this section as I update.

Saving meats:
Make a trap, as many as you wish, and make a lot of chests. You'll need a lot of weak/expiring food in order for this to be the most efficent. Place food like carrots or berries in your traps (as they are pretty much the only foods that attract rabbits). PLACE THESE NEAR RABBIT HOLES. You don't have to use bait though. You can make them walk towards the trap by chasing them in the direction of the trap. When you catch these rabbits, don't murder them, rather put them in the chests. You'll need quite a few chests to store enough rabbits to last you through. As mentioned earlier, Morsel has a sanity loss and if you ate too many rabbits and have a chest left of rabbits, odds are they will have turned into beardlings.

If you ever find an eye bone pick it up even if you have to trash something. Chester can be valuable as he is a portable chest. He follows you around and if you keep some non-expiring foods in him he can save your life. He does not fight back but he has a decent amount of health and he will eventually respawn. Be careful though as he takes about a full in-game week to respawn.

If you play as wendy remember that abagail can help you get some easy food. Having trouble killing that pig or koalephant? Let abagail handle most of it for you. She only has a chance of spawning and it's probably rarer then mandrake getting struck by lightning (which happened to me once) when she spawns when you actually need her. Most of the time she'll probably spawn when you are destroying a tier 1 spider den for some silk or glands. Abagail has a mass of health as I saw her fend off for a minute while being hit by a herd of beefalo. In older versions of the game abagail was jealous of chester and would kill him off on-sight. Abagail can easily get you food by killing off the enemies you though you wouldn't get any other time. But wendy's abillity is not that valuable compared to characters like wolfgang and wickerbottom.

Leave comments in the comment section below. Did this help you? Could I have executed this better? Let me know.

[Blob]

i like it

[AAAck]

3 gints can pop up at the same time

[Birb]

mr author, i would love to see you make more guides and i want you to know youre a wonderful person

[the]

sweet potato in shipwrecked

[Kociak]

:D

[Sailor Leukemia]

You saved me from insanity, but after 27 days of survival and a hard winter, i was killed by pigs when i wanted to make a meat effigy. SH*T.

[Clarion77]

Thank you, helpful. Favorite.

[WetBreadMachine]

Remember that this guide was last updated in October 2013 - It's outdated and I don't exactly have plans to update it. However, thank you for pointing that out.

[DaBoom]

overall good guide, but it's not perfect. for example, this, if I'm not mistaken, is not completely true:

> The first full of jam can be made with 4 berries in a crock pot. It's a lot more potent then 4 berries seperately

fistful of jam restores 37.5 hunger

whereas:

1 raw berry restores 9.375 hunger (x4=37.5 hunger)
1 cooked berry restores 12.5 hunger (x4=50 hunger)

so 4 cooked berries are better than a fistful of jam. you gain just more days with the spoilage.

[Super Earth President]

well those 2 game are almost same