Cooked food is the fastest way to refill Energy in Graveyard Keeper 2 without trekking home to sleep, and a few dishes also cut Insanity, grant temporary mastery buffs, or hand you research points. Every meal is made at either the Kitchen Table or the Kitchen Oven inside your house, and almost none of them exist until you rebuild both stations and start researching the Cooking tree.
Quick answer: At home, fix the Broken Kitchen Table and Broken Oven, construct a Firewood Shed to supply the Oven, and research dishes individually in the Cooking tech tree. Vendors and NPC quests offer the hardest-to-find meals.
Repair the Kitchen Table and Oven first
On entering through your front door, you’ll find both broken stations on your left. Use the Kitchen Table for cold assembly and meat or fish preparation; the Oven handles dishes that require heat. You need Building mastery 3 to repair them, earned naturally as you chop trees and mine rock while clearing your graveyard.
Building mastery only matters for repairing or placing these stations. The actual recipes run on Farming mastery, so a working Oven does not mean you meet the level requirement for every dish it can make.
Fuel the Oven with a Firewood Shed
The Oven needs Fuel for every recipe; without any, you cannot cook even one dish. Build a Firewood Shed inside your house to produce Fuel, and do so before unlocking recipes you’d otherwise be unable to prepare.
Find the Firewood shed I blueprint in the Metallurgy tree, near Bronze Melting; placing it requires Building mastery 2. After construction, supply it with Firewood made from Short Logs at the Chopping Spot. It turns 2 Firewood into 20 Fuel, meaning a recipe listing 10 Fuel uses less than 10 pieces of Firewood.
Most Oven recipes use less Fuel with the Heat Saver perk, while Cook and Cook II increase the portions you get from each batch. Unlock these in the Farming talent tree before producing food in large quantities.
Meet the mastery requirement with the Cook perk
Even with the right station and ingredients, some recipes require a mastery level. Baked fish, for instance, cannot be made at the Oven until you meet its Farming mastery requirement. Purchase the Cook perk from the Inspirations menu to increase mastery and qualify.
The Cook perk increases the yield of basic dishes, complementing batch cooking. For more advanced Oven recipes, Cook II provides that same output increase. A recipe is available when it appears in the station menu without a mastery warning and your shed contains sufficient Fuel.
Which technology unlocks each recipe
Most dishes become available at the Kitchen Table or Kitchen Oven when you research their associated cooking technology. A few high-tier fish dishes are obtained instead through vendor trades and NPC quest rewards, making side activities a way to add recipes. Herm, the village merchant, is one early source: finish his fish requests to unlock Baked fish and other fish dishes.
| Technology | Recipes it unlocks |
|---|---|
| Bread | Dough, Bread |
| First snacks | Berry Smoothie, Yogurt |
| First dishes | Baked Apple, Baked Mushrooms, Berry Pie |
| Pastries | Muffin, Croissant |
| Vegetable dishes | Vegetable Soup, Vegetable Salad |
| Carrot dishes | Carrot Cutlet, Carrot Soup |
| Beet dishes | Grated Beets, Beet Slices |
| Cabbage dishes | Bowl of Sauerkraut, Cabbage Soup |
| Onion dishes | Onion Rings, Toast with Onions |
| Pumpkin dishes | Pumpkin Soup, Baked Pumpkin |
| Oh no! | Baked Meat, Sandwich |
| Anyway… | Minced Meat, Burger, Lasagna |
| River fish dishes | River Fish Fillet, Fish Nuggets, Baked Fish |
| Sea fish dishes | Sea Fish Fillet, Fish Soup, Baked Salmon |
| Mysterious fish dishes | Mysterious Fish Fillet, Fisherman’s Pie |
| Soldier’s food | Soldier’s Ale, Soldier’s Stew |
| Chocolate | Chocolate |
| Fried golden carp | Fried Golden Carp |
| Heavenly salmon | Heavenly Salmon |
| Kraken steak | Kraken Steak |
| Elder’s meal | Elder’s Meal |
Silver and gold grades of dishes such as Cabbage Soup, Onion Rings, Pumpkin Soup and Bowl of Sauerkraut are separate upgrade recipes. Each must be unlocked on its own, sometimes through story progress, on top of the base technology.
Kitchen Table recipes and effects
These dishes require no heat: assemble them at the Kitchen Table or Kitchen Table II without spending Fuel. Farming 1 to 3 is enough for half of them, making them among the first dishes most players encounter. Dough and the three fish fillets are ingredients for preparation, not food.
| Recipe | Ingredients | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Dough | 6 Flour + 2 Water | Ingredient only |
| Berry smoothie | 4 Berry + 2 Apple | 25 Energy |
| Yogurt | 1 Jug of Milk + 1 Honey | 30 Energy |
| Beet slices | 3 Beet | 15 Energy |
| Grated beets | 4 Beet + 1 Seed oil | 35 Energy |
| Bowl of sauerkraut | 3 Cabbage + 1 Salt + 1 Seed oil | 20/25/30 Energy, Book writing Spirit I–III |
| Vegetable salad | 2 Onion + 2 Carrot + 2 Beet | 15/20/25 Energy, Anatomy Spirit I–III |
| Sandwich | 1 Cabbage + 1 Baked meat + 2 Bread | 50 Energy, +5 Insanity |
| Burger | 1 Onion + 1 Minced Meat + 2 Bread | 80 Energy, +5 Insanity |
| Chocolate | 4 Cacao (Kitchen Table II) | 50 Energy, -20 Insanity |
| River fish fillet | 1 river fish | Ingredient only |
| Sea fish fillet | 1 sea fish | Ingredient only |
| Mysterious fish fillet | 1 Goldfish, Silverfin or Swamp Ghost | Ingredient only |
River fish fillet accepts Roach, Gudgeon, Crucian, Herring, Bream, Carp, Pike or Catfish. Sea fish fillet accepts Anchovy, Mackerel, Tuna, Salmon, Eel or Trout. Bowl of sauerkraut and Vegetable salad roll a random star quality below Farming 4; at Farming 4 and above every work tick succeeds and a single craft lands the top tier on its own.
Kitchen Oven recipes and effects
Every dish in this group uses a Kitchen Oven or Kitchen Oven II and consumes Fuel. The costs shown are the regular amounts, before Heat Saver roughly cuts them in half.
| Recipe | Ingredients | Fuel | Effect |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bread | 4 Dough | 10 | 18 Energy |
| Baked apple | 5 Apple | 10 | 21 Energy |
| Baked mushrooms | 5 Brown Mushrooms | 10 | 27 Energy |
| Berry Pie | 4 Dough + 6 Berry | 20 | 30 Energy, -3 Insanity |
| Muffin | 4 Dough + 1 Jug of Milk | 10 | 20 Energy, Farming spirit II |
| Croissant | 4 Dough + 1 Chicken Egg | 10 | 20 Energy, -5 Insanity |
| Carrot cutlet | 4 Carrot | 10 | 15 Energy |
| Carrot soup | 4 Carrot + 2 Water | 20 | 19 Energy |
| Cabbage soup | 2 Cabbage + 1 Water | 20 | 25 Energy |
| Onion rings | 3 Onions + 1 Seed oil | 15 | 35 Energy |
| Toast with onions | 1 Onion + 3 Dough | 15 | 20 Energy, Beer thirst buff |
| Pumpkin soup | 2 Pumpkin + 1 Jug of Milk | 20 | 20 Energy, Building Spirit II |
| Baked pumpkin | 2 Pumpkin | 10 | 25 Energy |
| Vegetable soup | 2 Beet + 2 Carrot | 25 | 25 Energy |
| Baked meat | 1 Flesh + 1 Salt | 15 | 40 Energy, +10 Insanity |
| Lasagna | 1 Minced Meat + 3 Dough | 25 | 50 Energy, +1 Insanity |
| Soldier’s stew | 4 Brown Mushrooms + 1 Jug of Milk | 20 | 25 Energy, Smithing spirit II |
| Fish nuggets | 1 River fish fillet + 1 Seed oil | 15 | 25 Energy |
| Baked fish | 2 River fish fillet | 15 | 40 Energy |
| Baked salmon | 1 Sea fish fillet + 1 Salt | 15 | 40 Energy |
| Fish soup | 2 Sea fish fillet + 2 Carrot | 20 | 30 Energy |
| Fisherman’s pie | 2 Mysterious fish fillet + 2 Frog | 20 | 20 Energy, 10 of each tech point |
Endgame rare-fish dishes
Four legendary meals each depend on catching a single rare fish, and each is unlocked through its own dedicated technology. They restore modest Energy but hand out large blocks of research points, which makes them worth cooking as tech accelerators rather than everyday food. All four use the Kitchen Oven with 25 Fuel.
| Dish | Ingredients | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Fried golden carp | 1 Mythic Carp + 1 Flour | 30 Energy, 50 Green points |
| Heavenly salmon | 1 Celestial Salmon + 1 Seed oil | 30 Energy, 50 Red points |
| Kraken steak | 1 Kraken Jr + 1 Salt | 30 Energy, 50 Blue points |
| Elder’s meal | 1 Elder Catfish + 1 Chicken Egg | 30 Energy, 30 of each tech point |
The rare fish come from fishing with Live Bait: Mythic Carp at the Village spot, Celestial Salmon at the Forest spot, Kraken Jr at the Port spot, and Elder Catfish at the Swamp spot. Research points cap at 999 per color, so anything above the cap when you eat one is wasted.
Where to get every ingredient
| Ingredient | How to get it |
|---|---|
| Water | Garden Well (10 per use) or Garden Well II (20) |
| Wheat | Wheat Bed, or buy from Herm, the Vegetable Stand or the Brewery |
| Flour | Process Wheat at the Millstone, or purchase from the Baker |
| Dough | Prepare at the Kitchen Table with 6 Flour + 2 Water, or purchase from the Baker |
| Bread | Kitchen Oven, or buy from the Baker |
| Berry | Pick from Ashberry and Barberry bushes around Town, Quarry, Graveyard and Riverside |
| Apple | Harvest 4–8 from each Apple tree, or purchase from the Vegetable Stand |
| Brown Mushroom | Forage near the Sawmill, Quarry, Garden and Bandit Camp, and in the Inquisition Dungeon |
| Honey | Build a Beehive in the Vineyard, or collect from wild hives near the Graveyard, Quarry and Riverside |
| Pumpkin, Cabbage, Onion, Carrot, Beet | Cultivate in the matching Bed, or purchase from the Vegetable Stand or Herm |
| Jug of Milk / Chicken Egg | Buy from the Baker or Herm |
| Salt | Buy from the Apothecary or Baker, or make at the Crematorium |
| Seed oil | Press Flax Seed or crop seeds at the Millstone |
| Flesh | Extract from corpse pockets with Pocket extract at the Autopsy Table, or purchase from the Baker |
| Minced Meat | Millstone, from Flesh |
| Frog | Fish the Swamp spot with no bait, or buy from the Fish Stand |
| Cacao | Buy from the Trademaster for 300 coins |
| Spices / Umami | Make at the Laboratory or buy from the Alchemist (upgrade dishes to 2 and 3 star) |
Farm-grown ingredients supply every part of the Bread recipe, making it an easy option to produce in bulk for the Master Chef achievement, which requires 100 meals total. Run Wheat through the Flour and Dough stages to sustain the entire production chain.
Best food to cook by purpose
The right meal depends on whether you want raw Energy, lower Insanity, or research progress. A few dishes clearly outperform the rest in each role.
- Burger — 80 Energy per serving, the highest of any dish, at the cost of +5 Insanity.
- Chocolate — 50 Energy and -20 Insanity, the strongest Insanity relief among cooked food.
- Lasagna — 50 Energy for only +1 Insanity, a clean high-Energy option.
- Sandwich — 50 Energy, +5 Insanity, cheap to assemble from Bread and Baked meat.
- Croissant — the only dish that lowers Insanity (-5) while restoring 20 Energy.
- Elder’s meal, Fried golden carp, Heavenly salmon, Kraken steak — best for banking research points late-game.
Every Energy value shown is the base amount before perks; the Food Energy Buff perk pushes most of them higher. Note that dishes cannot be sold back anywhere, so cooking is a convenience system, not an income source. For steady day-to-day use, keep a stack of Burgers or Lasagna for Energy and a few Chocolates on hand for when Insanity climbs too high.
