The Sims 3 Skill Guides:
Athletic | Charisma | Collecting | Cooking | Fishing | Gardening
Guitar | Handiness | Logic | Martial Arts | Nectar Making | Painting | Parenting | Photography | Writing
The Sims 3 Cooking Guide
About Cooking, and How to Cook Perfect Food
Guide Navigation:Cooking Overview | Master Cooking | Recipe List | Ambrosia | Good Traits
Challenges and Opportunities
Welcome to my The Sims 3 Cooking Guide. Within this section of the site, you'll learn about the cooking skill and all its aspects. I'll give you helpful tips to raising your Sim's skill as a chef, and help your Sim cook perfect food. You'll also find a full list of recipes, and information about the cooking challenges and opportunities in the game.
Each of the new destinations in World Adventures adds new recipes to the game. We've updated the recipe list to include these new types of food. Know that each new recipe can be purchased from the book vendor in the travel destinations, the list may be helpful for learning the new stuff that's out there and where you'd like your Sim to focus their efforts. There are some great meals to be made and Sims who spend enough time in China can even learn to eat their food with chopsticks like the locals do. The addition of these recipes of course changes the Menu Maven challenge to require your Sim to learn 28 recipes, so travel will be helpful if you want to complete it a little earlier or avoid learning the ambrosia recipe.
Why Your Sims Need Cooking
The cooking skill has a use for every Sim, because all Sims must eat! In order to be truly happy, Sims need to enjoy fine meals. The mood boost from eating a well-cooked meal is invaluable for every Sim. The positive moodlet it grants lasts a full eight hours, as well. Getting the mood bar as high as posisble will help with work, learning other skills, and help keep the lifetime happiness points rolling in. Quick meals will only satisfy hunger, and fail to give any boost to mood.
Fires are also a hazard that comes with a low cooking skill. I'm sure a million Sims have died from fires caused by cooking waffles alone. The financial losses are also high, because insurance usually serves only to pay for a portion of the cost of a new appliance. With just a few levels in the skill, the dangers of fire are almost completely nullified, as Sims will no longer burn food.
Money-Making
You won't really make money with this skill aside from the rewards of an occasional opportunity. That is, directly. Sims who pursue the culinary career track will find that their cooking skills make them a load of cash. Five-Star chefs can bring in $1400 and up working only four hours a night. The three night a week schedule leaves them plenty of opportunity to pursue other skills as well. Click to learn about the Culinary Career Track
Cooking Perfect Food
Cooking perfect food in the Sims 3 isn't that difficult, but the right combination of bonuses to meal quality will need to be present to make it happen more quickly. First, as a ray of hope to all the aspiring chefs out there, cooking a meal multiple times will increase the quality of that meal. Your Sim learns to cook these meals better from experience. It's a good idea to focus on your Sim's favorite food and improve its quality. Specialize in a breakfast, lunch and dinnner meal. Your Sim will eventually want to make that food, giving you an outlet for more lifetime happiness points. Your skill journal will tell you what type of food has been your biggest hit, and you should consider making that the meal of choice for your Sim's parties.
The quality of the ingredients your Sim is using is also a factor in the food's end quality. Your Sim can look for produce from wild plants, and even grow good ingredients by using the gardening skill itself. This is vital to your Sim being able to cook Ambrosia. Sims can even eventually learn to grow cheese, eggs and meat as well to get high quality versions of those ingredients. Fishermen can catch fish to provide quality ingredients for their cooking efforts. These two work very well in combination. A high level gardener can even learn to grow Omni plants and duplicate the death fish they've caught from fishing.
The chef's traits can also help his cooking efforts. This bonus is primarly gained through the natural cook trait. The trait itself will boost the food quality. They also get the ability to 'kick up a notch' any meals they've prepared, which will bump the quality of the meal by one level toward perfect. The perfectionist trait will also help, although it will cause meals to take longer to prepare. Perfectionists tend to spend more time doing something, but do it better than other Sims.
Don't skimp on the kitchen equipment. Low quality stoves can cause uneven cooking, which your Sims won't like. Higher quality appliances give a boost to the quality of the meal directly. The MinusOne Kelvin Refrigerator, or "Master Chef Fridge" will vastly improve meal quality, and is available to Sims who have ascended to the top level job in the Culinary career track, Five Star Chef.
Your Sim's progress in the cooking skill is probably the most important factor. The skill level itself will lead to higher quality meals, and the challenges associated with it can set it through the roof. Completing all three challenges for the cooking skill would give a Sim higher quality meals that are prepared faster and give an even higher boost to mood.
Cooking Guide Navigation:
Cooking Overview | Master Cooking | Recipe List | Ambrosia | Good Traits
Challenges and Opportunities
The Sims 3 Skill Guides:
Athletic | Charisma | Collecting | Cooking | Fishing | Gardening
Guitar | Handiness | Logic | Martial Arts | Nectar Making | Painting | Parenting | Photography | Writing