Last major update: 2008-04-05 for patch 2.4 (The Burning Crusade, TBC)
Cooking is a secondary profession that anyone can train, as it doesn’t take up a primary profession slot. Training cooking is optional; you don’t really need cooking. However, it has been greatly buffed in The Burning Crusade, so if you play TBC it’s definitely worth leveling up your cooking skill.
There are other good reasons to level up your cooking.
For example, rogues will want the Thistle Tea that instantly restores some energy. The Egg Nog is kind of fun, as it can turn you into a reindeer or snowman and makes you drunk to boot. Besides, there are powerful buffs from the food you cook, and you’ll make quite a bit of extra gold from cooking the high level recipes (which are easy to obtain).
As a secondary skill that anyone can learn, definitely get cooking. With this guide you’ll be able to level it up rapidly and get all the common recipes.
How to cook food in WoW
First you need to be close to a fire. Most any fire will do, but if you can’t find one in the environment you need to make one.
Use the Basic Campfire ability found on the general tab of your spellbook. You have to learn cooking at a cooking trainer to have access to that ability. It takes 10 seconds to make a fire which lasts 10 minutes.
When standing at the fire, bring up the cooking window from the general tab in your spellbook, choose the food you want to create and click the create button. That’s it.
Cooking leveling guide (Alliance, without fishing)
Note: You can level up cooking and fishing at the same time, using the fish you catch to increase your cooking skill, because then you kill two birds with one stone as you gain skill in fishing and cooking simultaneously. However, this guide shows you how to level up cooking without fishing, as fishing takes a long time and you can still benefit greatly just from cooking.
- Start in Ironforge. Learn apprentice cooking. Learn Spice Bread. Buy enough Simple Flour and Mild Spices one floor down to get your skill to 40 which is all you can get with Spice Bread. Cook it at the fire outside the building.
- Buy 30 mild spices one floor down from the cooking trainer. Buy 1 x Flint and Tinder and 20 x Simple Wood from Bryllia Ironbrand. Make Ironforge your home.
- Fly to Menethil Harbor. Boat to Auberdine. Or you can take a portal to Darnassus and fly to Auberdine.
- Kill moonkin until you have enough small eggs to take your cooking skill to at least 60. You probably only need 20, but they are so simple to get here that you can go for 30. It only takes a few minutes if you’re higher level.
- Go south into Ashenvale and then out to the west coast and kill Clattering and Spined Crawlers.
- They will drop Small Barnacled Clam, which always contain 1 clam meat, as well as crawler meat. You will get about 50/50. Collect at least 40 of each, a few more to be safe.
- Run down to Shandrina in Ashenvale and buy the Expert Cookbook.
- Hearth to Ironforge.
- Cook your small eggs so you reach at least 60 skill. Go to the cooking trainer and learn Journeyman Cooking and Boiled Clams. Buy as many Refreshing Spring Water as you have clam meat from the cooking supplier. Start cooking your clam meat.
- Now learn crab cake from the trainer. Cook all your crawler meat. At least make sure you get 130 skill then learn expert cooking by using the Expert Cookbook.
- Fly or take the tram to Stormwind. Buy the recipe for curiously tasty omelet from Kendor Kabonka. Learn it. Buy 120 x hot spices from Edna Mullby. While you’re in Stormwind, buy 20 Alterac Swiss from Elaine Trias. Save these for later.
- Fly to Darkshire in Duskwood. Run down to the Rebel Camp in Stranglethorn Vale. Buy the recipe for roast raptor from Corporal Bluth.
- Go around Grom’gol Base Camp and kill Lashtail Raptors for raptor eggs and raptor flesh. Make sure you get enough to take your skill from 130+ to 225. That may require more than 100 eggs and flesh together, depending on the distribution. I ended up with 58 eggs and 46 raptor flesh after a bit of grinding.
- Cook all your raptor eggs first. At 175 you can learn roast raptor, but continue cooking the eggs until you’re out. Then cook the raptor flesh until you are at skill 225. Don’t leave here until you are at 225. 58 eggs took me from 141 to 193. 38 flesh took me to 225. Hold on to any extra flesh you have.
- Hearth to Ironforge, fly to Menethil Harbor. Boat to Theramore Isle. Fly to Gadgetzan. Make it your home.
- Accept Clamlette Surprise from Dirge Quikcleave in the inn.
- Go out to the shore and kill Steeljaw Snappers for Big-Mouth Clams that always contain zesty clam meat. You can also kill Surf Gliders, they drop more clams. Collect 10 zesty clam meat.
- Kill rocs for giant eggs. When you have 12 eggs, return to Gadgetzan and turn in the quest since you already have the cheese. You will learn artisan cooking which allows 300 cooking skill upon completion. Cook any extra raptor flesh you have.
- Fly to Winterspring. Buy Recipe: Monster Omelet from Himmik. Grind owlbeasts north of Everlook and any winterspring owls and screechers you see for giant eggs. Collect enough to take your cooking skill from 225 to 250. You may need 25-30. There is a cooking fire next to the flight master.
- Visit Malygen in Felwood and purchase Recipe: Juicy Bear Burger and Recipe: Charred Bear Kabobs. Then kill bears almost anywhere in Felwood until you get to 285.
- Hearth to Gadgetzan. Fly to Silithus. Accept Desert Recipe from the Innkeeper in Cenarion Hold. Turn it in on a box in the western part of the first Twilight camp to the west of CH. Accept Sharing The Knowledge. Turn it in at the inn. You’ll learn how to make Smoked Desert Dumplings, upon its completion, that will be orange all the way up to 300. Just kill the Dredge Crushers and Strikers all around Cenarion Hold for mats and buy soothing spices in CH. You may also want to turn in 10 Smoked Desert Dumplings at the innkeeper for the follow-up quest. Rewards some XP and/or gold.
- If you have The Burning Crusade, you can continue to 375. First you have to learn Master Cooking which is trainable with a book sold by Gaston or Naka.
- Then do the quest Smooth As Butter to get Recipe: Buzzard Bites. Go back and kill buzzards and cook their meat until you have 325 skill.
- Then go buy Recipe: Talbuk Steak from Uriku and kill talbuks in Nagrand. They are all over the place. Cook their meat until you reach 335 skill or more.
- Purchase Recipe: Crunchy Serpent and Recipe: Mok’Nathal Shortribs from Sassa Weldwell.
- Then grind raptors and serpents and cook their meat until you’re at 375. You will need A TON of meat to get the last few skill points.
Cooking leveling guide (Horde, without fishing)
Note: It’s best to level up cooking and fishing at the same time, using the fish you catch to increase your cooking skill. However, this is how you do it if you just want to level up cooking, as fishing takes a looooong time and you can still benefit greatly just from cooking.
- Make Orgrimmar your home.
- Learn cooking from the cooking trainer in Orgrimmar. Purchase flint and tinder and 20 simple wood from Trak’gen. You can now make campfires to cook food wherever you want.
- Go to Darkshore (fly to Ashenvale then go to Darkshore) and kill moonkin for small eggs. They drop about 55% small egg. Use those to reach 60 skill. Get 70 eggs so you at least have enough.
- Go south into Ashenvale and then out to the west coast and kill Clattering and Spined Crawlers. They will drop Small Barnacled Clam, which always contain 1 clam meat, as well as crawler meat. You will get about 50/50. Collect at least 40 of each, a few more to be safe.
- Fly to Desolace and purchase the expert cookbook from Wulan.
- Hearth to Org.
- Cook your small eggs so you reach at least 60 skill. Go to the cooking trainer and learn Journeyman Cooking and Boiled Clams. Buy as many Refreshing Spring Water as you have clam meat from the innkeeper. Cook all your clam meat.
- Now learn crab cake from the trainer. Buy as many mild spices as you have crawler meat from the NPC beside the cooking trianer. Cook all your crawler meat. At least make sure you get 130 skill then learn expert cooking by using the Expert Cookbook. Before you leave here, buy 120 hot spices from the cooking supplier.
- Get on the zeppelin to Grom’Gol (Stranglethorn Vale). Buy Recipe: Curiously Tasty Omelet and Recipe: Roast Raptor from Nerrist.
- Go around Grom’gol Base Camp and kill lashtail raptors for raptor eggs and raptor flesh. Make sure you get enough to take your skill from 130+ to 225. That may require more than 100 eggs and flesh together, depending on the distribution. I ended up with 58 eggs and 46 raptor flesh after a bit of grinding.
- Cook all your raptor eggs first. At 175 you can learn roast raptor, but continue cooking the eggs until you’re out. Then cook the raptor flesh until you are at skill 225. Don’t leave here until you are at 225. 58 eggs took me from 141 to 193. 38 flesh took me to 225. Hold on to any extra flesh you have.
- Hearth to Org. Fly to Freewind Post (Thousand Needles). Buy 20 Alterac Swiss from Innkeeper Abeqwa.
- Fly to Gadgetzan. Make it your home.
- Accept Clamlette Surprise from Dirge Quikcleave in the inn.
- Go out to the shore and kill Steeljaw Snappers for Big-Mouth Clams that always contain zesty clam meat. You can also kill Surf Gliders, they drop more clams. Collect 10 zesty clam meat.
- Kill rocs for giant eggs. When you have 12 eggs, hearth to Gadgetzan and turn in the quest since you already have the cheese. You will learn artisan cooking which allows 300 cooking skill upon completion. Cook any extra raptor flesh you have.
- Fly to Winterspring. Buy Recipe: Monster Omelet from Himmik. Grind owlbeasts north of Everlook and any winterspring owls and screechers you see for giant eggs. Collect enough to take your cooking skill from 225 to 250. You may need 25-30. There is a cooking fire next to the flight master. Soothing spices can be purchased in Everlook.
- Visit Bale in Felwood and purchase Recipe: Juicy Bear Burger and Recipe: Charred Bear Kabobs. Then kill bears almost anywhere in Felwood until you get to 285.
- Fly to Silithus. Accept Desert Recipe from the Innkeeper in Cenarion Hold. Turn it in on a box in the western part of the first Twilight camp to the west of CH. Accept Sharing The Knowledge. Turn it in at the inn. You’ll learn how to make Smoked Desert Dumplings, upon its completion, that will be orange all the way up to 300. Just kill the Dredge Crushers and Strikers all around Cenarion Hold for mats. You may also want to cook 10 Smoked Desert Dumplings and turn in at the innkeeper for the follow-up quest. Rewards some XP and/or gold.
- If you have The Burning Crusade, you can continue to 375. First you have to learn Master Cooking which is trainable with a book sold by Baxter or Naka.
- Then do the quest Smooth As Butter to get Recipe: Buzzard Bites. Go back and kill buzzards and cook their meat until you have 325 skill.
- Then go buy Recipe: Talbuk Steak from Nula the Butcher and kill talbuks in Nagrand. They are all over the place. Cook their meat until you reach 335 skill or more.
- Go do the quest Mok’Nathal Treats which rewards Recipe: Mok’Nathal Shortribs and Recipe: Crunchy Serpent.
- Then grind raptors and serpents and cook their flesh until you’re at 375. Warning: You will need A TON of meat to get the last few skill points.
How to learn Journeyman / Expert / Artisan / Master cooking
- Get your cooking skill past 75 by learning the journeyman cooking skill at any cooking trainer (requires 50 cooking skill).
- Get your cooking skill past 150 by learning expert cooking from the expert cookbook sold in Ashenvale to the Alliance and Desolace to the Horde (requires 125 cooking skill).
- Get your cooking skill past 225 by completing the Clamlette Surprise quest given by Dirge Quikcleave in Gadgetzan in Tanaris (Horde & Alliance). You must be level 35 to get the quest, and possibly have 225 cooking skill.
- Get your cooking skill past 300 (if you have The Burning Crusade only) by going to Outland and purchasing the Master Cookbook
WoW cooking recipes
It’s easy to collect 98% of all cooking recipes, especially so for the Horde since they have access to far fewer recipes. By Horde or Alliance I mean that only that faction can get the recipe from a quest or vendor. You can, of course, transfer the Alliance or Horde recipes to the other faction, through the neutral auction houses in Gadgetzan, Booty Bay or Everlook, but it can be a pain.
Note: All quests are linked in the WoW Cooking Quests table below this one.
* Recipe: Egg Nog can only be bought from goblin NPCs in the major cities between December 15th – January 2nd.
** Goldthorn Tea is taught by an NPC in RFD. Just follow the left path when you come in until the end, where you can free some prisoners. One of them is the man.
WoW cooking quests
You can also look at daily cooking quests.
As you can see from the table below, most cooking recipes that you can get from completing quests can also be bought at a vendor, without doing the quest. You can see the vendors in the Cooking Recipes table above, by clicking on the “vendor” links.
|
Quest |
Reward |
Side |
Notes |
| Clamlette Surprise | Artisan Cooking (Up to 300 skill) | Both | |
| Recipe of the Kaldorei | Recipe: Kaldorei Spider Kabob | Alliance | |
| Beer Basted Boar Ribs | Recipe: Beer Basted Boar Ribs | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Goretusk Liver Pie | Recipe: Goretusk Liver Pie | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Easy Strider Living | Recipe: Strider Stew | Alliance | Horde: Vendor |
| Thelsamar Blood Sausages | Recipe: Blood Sausage | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Mission: Possible But Not Probable | Recipe: Thistle Tea | Horde | Vendor too, if done quest. |
| Klaven’s Tower | Recipe: Thistle Tea | Alliance | Vendor too, if done quest. |
| Westfall Stew | Recipe: Westfall Stew | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Crocolisk Hunting | Recipe: Crocolisk Steak | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Selling Fish | Recipe: Murlock Fin Soup | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Dig Rat Stew | Recipe: Dig Rat Stew | Horde | |
| Redridge Goulash | Recipe: Redridge Goulash | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Seasoned Wolf Kabobs | Recipe: Seasoned Wolf Kabob | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Dusky Crab Cakes | Recipe: Gooey Spider Cake | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| The Rescue | Recipe: Big Bear Steak | Horde | Both sides can purchase from vendor |
| Apprentice’s Duties | Recipe: Crocolisk Gumbo | Alliance | Vendor too. |
| Elixir of Pain | Recipe: Hot Lion Chops | Horde | Both sides can purchase from vendor |
| Ormer’s Revenge pt 3 | Recipe: Curiously Tasty Omelet | Alliance | Horde & Alliance: vendor too |
| Costly Menace | Recipe: Tasty Lion Steak | Alliance | |
| Soothing Turtle Bisque (Alliance) | Recipe: Soothing Turtle Bisque | Alliance | |
| Soothing Turtle Bisque (Horde) | Recipe: Soothing Turtle Bisque | Horde | |
| Barbecued Buzzard Wings | Recipe: Barbecued Buzzard Wing | Both | Both sides can purchase from vendor |
| Desert Recipe (Start of chain) | Smoked Desert Dumplings | Both | |
| Dirge’s Kickin’ Chimaerok Chops * | Recipe: Dirge’s Kickin’ Chimaerok Chops | Both | |
| Smooth As Butter | Recipe: Buzzard Bites | Both | |
| Mok’Nathal Treats | Recipe: Crunchy Serpent & Recipe: Mok’Nathal Shortribs | Horde | Alliance: Vendor |
* In order to be eligible to start the quest chain, you must first do What Tomorrow Brings, Only One May Rise, and have neutral or better reputation with Brood of Nozdormu.
Making gold with cooking
If you think cooking is a useless profession, banish the thought. It’s been greatly buffed in The Burning Crusade and I now recommend everyone to get 375 cooking, as it can be very useful and profitable for you.
The best profession to use together with cooking is skinning. The reason, of course, is that beasts can be skinned and often drop meat that can be cooked, so you kill two birds with one stone.
Here I will give you some profitable ideas for making gold with cooking (and skinning).
- Mok’Nathal Shortribs. Kill any of these raptors in Blade’s Edge Mountains. They don’t drop any specialty leather, just the normal Knothide Leather and Knothide Leather Scraps, but roughly 1 in 3 will drop the reagent for the shortribs, which is worth 1 gold or more when cooked and sold on the Auction House. If you kill 100 mobs per hour, that’s 33 extra gold with cooking.
- A better idea, or one that can be combined with the raptors, is to kill serpents in Blade’s Edge Mountains. They have a chance to drop Wind Scales when skinned, a special leather which can be worth 1-3 gold or more depending on your realm. They also drop serpent flesh, that when cooked becomes Crunchy Serpent which is worth around 1 g each on the AH.
- Selling Warp Burgers (what a great name) is something else you can try. By killing Warp Hunters in terokkar forest you’re getting a 50% drop chance of warped flesh, that you can cook into Warp Burgers that sell for 1 g each. That’s 50 g an hour just for that if you kill 100 per hour.
- Roasted Clefthoof doesn’t sell for more than 7 gold per stack, or so, usually. However, with a 50% drop rate of Clefthoof Meat from Clefthoof Bulls, that also have a 30% drop rate of Thick Clefthoof Leather when skinned, you can make 150 gold or more per hour here with skinning and cooking.
- One of the great mysteries of life is that Talbuk Steak with the exact same properties as Mok’Nathal Shortribs is worth far less. However, that may be different on your realm. In my experience, most of the good buff foods from Outland can be sold for 1 g a piece. Talbuk Venison comes mostly from Talbuks in Nagrand and, since you’ll be grinding on those beasts for some quests in that zone, make sure to keep and cook the meat they drop. Talbuks don’t drop any specialty leather when skinned so it’s hardly worth grinding on them just for the food and normal skins.
- Blackened Basilisk sells for for 1 g a piece, and while I haven’t found any really good place to grind basilisks, you should save all the Chunks o’ Basilisk that you find in Outland.
- Ravager Dog is yet another food that you can sell for 1 g each. It’s best farmed from ravagers in Hellfire Peninsula due to their lower level and HP, and they drop just as much ravager flesh as the higher level ravagers.
- Clam Bar is a food with exactly the same buff as Talbuk Steak and Mok’Nathal Shortribs, but it restores less life. It still sells for 1 g each, though. The reagent comes from Jaggal Clams and is not really worth farming for all by itself. But hold on to any Jaggal Clam Meat you find. Also, when I go into the coilfang dungeons (Slave Pens, Underbog and Steamvaults) I might ask at the start or afterwards if other party members could give me their clam meat if they don’t need it, and you can get quite a few that way.
- I find that they Azerothian (pre TBC) recipes are not really worth bothering with for gold. There is one I want to mention though: Egg Nog. This item is used during the “Christmas” season in WoW for a quest. Since everyone just wants to get it over with and many high level players can’t be asked to farm the reagents, you can sell this for 1 gold each (maybe even more) for the first days of the Feast of Winter Veil. You should farm the small eggs in advance, and they are very easy to farm, so you can buy the spices immediately when the feast starts and put the egg nogs up for sale on the AH.
Another way to make some gold with cooking is to purchase the raw reagents on the AH if you can find them cheaply, then cook them and sell the finished food expensively.
Keep in mind when selling food on the AH that the deposit is very low. Therefore you can demand the highest possible price and not worry about your auctions expiring, since you can relist them for cheap. I will often sell my food in stacks on 5.
The downside is that it can sometimes be hard to sell food. There just aren’t too many players looking for buff foods, so you may have to relist repeatedly. But, as stated above, the costs for doing so are small.
Daily cooking quests
In patch 2.3, daily cooking quests were introduced. They start from The Rokk if you are level 70 and have 275+ cooking and there are 4 different quests (random):
- Manalicious — Gather 15 mana berries from Mana Berry Bushes. You can track them on your minimap if you have herbalism.
- Revenge is Tasty — Gather 1 Giant Kaliri Wing from Monstrous Kaliri. Gather 3 warped flesh from Blackwind Warp Chasers. Cook up the warped flesh into warp burgers, then use your cooking pot at a campfire to make the Kaliri Stew.
Tip: You can collect 1 extra Giant Kaliri Wing after you’ve made the Kaliri Stew. And, of course, you can gather unlimited amounts of warped flesh, so you don’t have to go back each time. - Soup for the Soul — Gather 4 Clefthoof Meat from Clefthoof Bulls and cook them into Roasted Clefthoof. Go to the Ancestral Grounds and use your cooking pot at the fire there. Tip: Gather more Clefthoof Meat and you won’t have to gather it each time.
- Super Hot Stew — Go to Blade’s Edge Mountains and kill raptors and serpents and cook 2 Mok’Nathal Shortribs and 1 Crunchy Serpent. Then go and kill an Abyssal Flamebringer and use your Cooking Pot next to its corpse to make the quest item.
Tip: Gather more Mok’Nathal Shortribs and Crunchy Serpent and you won’t have to gather them each time.
Each quest awards a few gold upon completion as well as your choice between Barrel of Fish and Crate of Meat. They can both contain various BoP (bind on equip) cooking recipes, as well as some fish or meat, respectively.
WotLK cooking daily quests
- Cheese for Glowergold (Alliance) / Cheese for Glowergold (Horde)
- Convention at the Legerdemain (Alliance) / Horde
- Infused Mushroom Meatloaf (Alliance) / Horde. Get 2 Chilled Meat (easiest is to buy from the auction house). Turn in at Orton Bennet.
- Mustard Dogs! (Alliance) / Horde
The Alliance versions of the quests start from Katherine Lee, while the Horde quests start from Awilo Lon’gomba.