Zelda: Breath of the Wild - best recipes and elixirs for hearts, cold resistance, defense, speed & stealth

Guide by Staff Contributor

Published on April 24, 2019

Cooking in Zelda: Breath of the Wild is about much more than replenishing health.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild has done away with finding hearts to replenish health. Instead you're going to have to cook to stay strong, create elixirs and reap plenty of other benefits. You'll find ingredients all around Hyrule, ready to stash in your pouch. From the menu highlight the items you want and drop them into a cooking pot. Now light the stove and watch the magic happen.

It's also worth noting that you can cook by setting fire to the environment, but don't expect to be rustling up a five-star dinner. This should only really be done in emergencies where you might need to cook raw meat to get your health back up. You can cook between 1 and 5 items together in a pot and hold up to 60 meals and/or elixirs at any one time.

Cooking recipies, star fragment, Blood Moon and dragon part bonuses

Beyond cooking simple foods to restore health, different foods and items create useful buffs. You'll need to experiment to see what you can make and how that boosts Link; A truffle, for example, will temporarily increase your maximum hearts, or creating a Chilly elixir will make you resistant to heat for a short period of time.

When you use an ingredient that contains a buff, it will have a prefix; Chilly, Energizing, Enduring, Electro, Fireproof, Hasty, Hearty, Mighty, Sneaky, Spicy and Tough.

You can't combine these separate buffs, so no meal will be both Hearty and Spicy. But you can combine the same ingredient to stack the buff, so throwing two chillies into a pot for a Spicy meal will make your resistance to cold longer lasting.

This is what each buff does:

Chilly - Resistance to heat
Energizing - Restores stamina
Enduring - Extra stamina
Electro - Resistance to shock
Fireproof - Flame Guard
Hasty - Increases movement speed
Hearty - Restores full health
Mighty - buffs Attack
Sneaky - buffs Stealth
Spicy - Resistance to cold
Tough - buffs Defence

On top of these buffs, when cooking you may also hear a special sound. When this happens you will receive an extra bonus. These are:

Extra yellow heart
Three extra hearts
Buff increase by a further 5 minutes
Buff increased by +1
Stamina increases

You can actually guarantee these bonuses by using particular items or cooking during a certain time.

Cooking during a Blood Moon, when the moon is red and enemies respawn, will give you a random bonus. As will using a star fragment or dragon body part in your recipe.

Zelda: Breath of the Wild best recipes & elixirs

These are some of the best recipes in the game, restoring bountiful amounts of health and stamina, combat boosts, buffs and other benefits.

Best recipes to restore hearts

Simple recipes to restore your health including those can be cooked on an open flame rather than requiring a cooking pot.

Omelet
Ingredients: Bird Egg
Effect: Restores 2 hearts

Meat Skewer
Ingredients: Apple, Raw Meat
Effect: Restores 3 hearts.

Seared Gourmet Steak
Ingredients: Raw Gourmet Meat
Effect: Restores 4 and half hearts, can be cooked on an open flame.

Fish and Mushroom Skewer
Ingredients: Fleet-Lotus Seeds, Zapshroom, Staminoka Bass.
Effect: Restores 7 hearts.

Glazed Meat
Ingredients: Hearty Truffle, Raw Meat, Courser Bee Honey.
Effect: Restores 10 hearts.

Best recipes for cold resistance

You'll need cold resistance early on in Breath of the Wild and all these ingredients are fairly common.

Spicy Fruit and Mushroom Mix
Ingredients: Hylian Shroom (x3), Spicy Pepper (x2).
Effect: Restores 5 hearts and gives cold resistance for 6 mins, 30 secs.

Spicy Pepper Seafood
Ingredients: Hyrule Bass, Spicy Pepper.
Effect: Restores 3 hearts and gives cold resistance for 3 mins.

Spicy Meaty Rice Balls
Ingredients: Raw Meat, Hylian Rice, Fresh Milk, Goat Butter, Spicy Pepper.
Effects: Restores 6 hearts and gives cold resistance for 6 mins, 40 secs.

Best recipe for heat resistance

A simple dish to keep yourself nice and chilled.

Chilly Steamed Fish
Ingredients: Hylian Shroom, Cool Safflina, Hyrule Bass.
Effects: Gives heat resistance for 3 mins, 30 secs.

Best recipes for electric resistance

Don't touch me, 'cos I'm electric, and if you touch me, you get shock-ock-ocked!

Electro Omlette
Ingredients: Electric Saffina (2), Acorn, Bird Egg (2).
Effects: Restores 5 hearts, gives electricity resistance for 7 mins 50 secs.

Electro Meat and Seafood Fry
Ingredients: Voltfin Trout (3), Raw Meat (2).
Effects: restores 10 hearts, gives electricity resistance for 8 mins 30 secs.

Best recipes to boost attack power

Some of the battles in Breath of the Wild can be tough. These recipes boost your attack power for a short duration and restore hearts.

Mighty Crab Risotto
Ingredients: Hylian Rice, Goat Butter, Rock Salt, Razorclaw Crab.
Effects: Restores 4 hearts, gives attack boost for 4 mins, 10 secs.

Mighty Steamed Fish
Ingredients: Bird Egg, Hyrule Herb, Razorclaw Crab.
Effects: Restores 6 hearts and gives attack boost for 2 mins 50 secs.

Best recipes for defense boost

The best defense is a nice big plate of food before a fight. Try these for better defense in battle.

Tough Fish and Mushroom Skewer
Ingredients: Hylian Shroom, Armored Carp.
Effects: Restores 3 hearts, gives defense boost for 1 min 20 secs.

Tough Milk
Fortified Pumpkin, Milk.
Effects: Restores 2 hearts, gives defence boost for 3 mins 30 secs.

Best recipes for speed boost

Get a wiggle on with these meals designed to increase movement speed.

Hasty Fish and Mushroom Skewer
Ingredients: Fleet-Lotus Seeds, Hylian Shroom, Hyrule Bass.
Effect: Restores 3 hearts and gives speed boost for 2 mins.

Hasty Friend Wild Greens
Ingredients: Swift Carrot.
Effects: Restores 1 heart, gives speed boost for 2 mins 10 secs.

Best recipes to restore stamina

Don't overlook stamina in Breath of Wild, as you can't do a lot of climbing or running without it.

Energizing Fish Skewer
Ingredients: Staminoka Bass
Effects: Restores 2 hearts, refills stamina to max.

Energizing Glazed Meat
Ingredients: Raw Meat, Courser Bee Honey.
Effects: Restore 6 hearts and refills some stamina.

Energizing Meaty Rice Balls
Ingredients: Raw Meat, Hylian Rice, Courser Bee Honey.
Effects: Restores eight hearts and restores all stamina.

Best recipes to increase stealth

Whether you want to sneak up on enemies or avoid a fight altogether, here's some cracking recipes for staying hidden.

Sneaky Fried Wild Greens
Ingredients: Blue Nightshade.
Effects: Gives stealth boost for 2 mins.

Sneaky Steamed Fish
Ingredients: Silent Shroom (x2), Silent Princess, Sneaky River Snail (x2).
Effects: Restores 8 hearts and gives stealth boost for 10 mins.

Elixirs: Receipes for Poitions

Spicy Elixir ingredients: Sizzlewing Butterfly, Bokoblin Fang.
Effect: Cold resistance.
Spicy Elixir ingredients: Warm Darner, Monster Parts.
Effect: Cold resistance.
Energizing Elixir ingredients: Bokoblin Horn, Restless Cricket.
Effect: Restores full Stamina.
Hasty Elixir ingredients: Highland Lizard, Monster Parts.
Effect: Increases movement speed.
Hasty Elixir ingredients: Hightail Lizard, Bokoblin Horn.
Effect: Increases movement speed for 2 mins 10 secs.
Hasty Elixir ingredients: Hot-footed Frog, Monster Parts.
Effect: Increases movement speed for 4 mins 10 secs.
Sneaky Elixir ingredients: Keese Eyeball, Sunset Firefly.
Effect: Increases stealth.
Sneaky Elixir ingredients: Sneaky River Snail, Sunset Firefly, Octorock Eyeball.
Effect: Increases stealth for 5 mins, 50 secs.
Electro Elixir ingredients: Thunderwing Butterfly, Yellow Lizalfos tail.
Effect: Electric resistance for 5 mins, 40 secs.
Electro Elixir ingredients: Thunderwing Butterfly, Electric Darner, Yellow Lizalfos tail.
Effect: Electric resistance for 8 mins 10 secs.
Chilly Elixir ingredients: Cold Darner, Red Lizalfos tail.
Effect: Heat resistance for 5 mins 40 secs.
Mighty Elixir ingredients: Bladed Rhino Beetle, Moblin Horn.
Effect: Attack boost for 2 mins.
Fairy Tonic ingredients: Fairy, Bokoblin Horn (x2), Bokoblin Fang (x2).
Effect: a recovery Elixir that rewards with five heart icons.