While travelling around the map in both Red Dead Redemption 2 and Red Dead Online, players have the ability to set up a small camp (different from your larger main camp), to rest and get access to a campfire which allows you to cook meals and craft a variety of items which are extremely important, such as powered-up ammo types for all weapons, throwable weapons and so on.
This is an often missed facet of the game and is incredibly useful, so we suggest you take note and read on.
Both cooking and crafting require players to have the correct items, which are gathered by hunting animals and finding herbs. So you will need to go off the beaten path and explore the world, outside of just doing the story missions, if you want to be successful at them.
In this guide, we will take a look at how cooking and crafting works in both Red Dead Redemption 2 and Red Dead Online. There aren’t many big differences, but they can be significant enough to throw off players that are coming straight to the online mode from single player.
Cooking
Cooking works pretty much the same in the Red Dead Redemption 2 story mode and Red Dead Online. To cook, players need to access any campfire, select the relevant option and have all the required ingredients.
All meals restore Health, Stamina and Dead Eye cores, but the quality of the cooked meals changes by how much each core is restored.
The most basic recipes, such as the plain meat ones, only require meat, but their properties are far from being the best, as you will only receive mild bonuses. Meat can either be purchased by butchers in most of the towns and cities, or obtained through hunting. Animal carcasses will always yield meat no matter the way the animal is killed, so don’t worry about getting perfect kills if you’re not aiming to get high-quality pelts as well.
Things get considerably better when cooking more complex meals, which also require herbs.
Cooking with herbs and spices will raise one particular core restoration by one level. Cooking with mint boosts Health core restoration, oregano boosts Stamina core restoration while creeping thyme boosts Dead Eye core restoration. To be able to cook with spices, you will need a grill, which is only available when setting up camp while traveling with your main horse, and at the Van der Linde camp.
The grill is not available from the very beginning of the game, however, as you need first to complete the Chapter 2 mission Exit Pursued by a Bruised Ego. Camps set up by other NPCs on the field can be used for cooking, but if they don’t have a grill, you will only be able to cook the most basic of recipes.
Unlike crafting recipes, which must be obtained first before becoming available, cooking recipes are all available from the beginning of the game as long as the correct items are possessed.
Cooking Recipes
Below you will find all of the available cooking recipes complete with description and required ingredients.
Coffee
- Moderately restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Ground Coffee x1
Gritty Fish
- Slightly restores all Cores
- Gritty Fish Meat x1
Minty Big Game
- Fully restores all Cores and yields a Gold Health Core for a day
- Big Game Meat x1, Wild Mint x1
Minty Crustacean
- Greatly restores Health Core, moderately restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Crustacean Meat x1, Wild Mint x1
Minty Exotic Bird
- Fully restores Health Core, greatly restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Exotic Bird Meat x1, Wild Mint x1
Minty Flaky Fish
- Greatly restores Health Core, moderately restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Flaky Fish Meat x1, Wild Mint x1
Minty Game
- Fully restores Health Core, greatly restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Game Meat x1, Wild Mint x1
Minty Mutton
- Greatly restores Health Core, moderately restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Gristly Mutton x1Wild Mint x1
Minty Plump Bird
- Greatly restores Health Core, moderately restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Plump Bird Meat x1, Wild Mint x1
Minty Pork
- Fully restores Health Core, greatly restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Tender Pork Loin x1, Wild Mint x1
Minty Prime Beef
- Fully restores Health Core, greatly restores Stamina Core and Dead Eye Core
- Prime Beef Joint x1, Wild Mint x1
