Forum's Opinion on meatballs being the only thing anyone eats ever.

[Yuuko]

Depends a lot of what character I'm playing.  I picked up Warly recently which instantly put me in "professional butcher" category while normally I'd probably be in "no more than 5 recipes ever."  Raw ingredients are amazing so there isn't always much reason to cook unless the only stat I'm topping off is hunger.  Usually I'm eating for more than that reason though - cactus to gain sanity, blue mushrooms to heal, crops etc.

[Echsrick]

where is the option for the last that i allready know many recipes?

[MondayNight]

As nomad is my center-most play-style, I tend to live off the land in a minimalist way, aka raw/roasted stuff. When Crock Pot cooking for bundling I usually go with Pierogi, Fishsticks, Beefy Greens and/or Surf 'n' Turf - but especially Pierogi. With a mobile single-boat-"base" later-on, including Pot and preserving storage (Fridge + Salt Box), for general use I employ mostly Meatballs, Bacon and Eggs, and Meaty Stews (depending on character; if going with my regular Walter-main, same sans Stews). Occasionally, if also farming (rarely, particularly Potatoes plus Dragon Fruits): Roasted Potatoes, Fancy Spiralled Tubers, Creamy Puree & DragonPies - contextually supplementing with Honey Hams, Turkey Dinners, Jelly Salad for Sanity (I place a boat-platform with Lighting Rod and a couple Lure Plants in somewhat secluded spot on ocean to have access to said Beefy Greens and Jelly Salad recipes for variety & special scenarios-sake). Still, as always, when not-raw I go for "default" junk-food of this game - Meatballs. Simple, convenient, quick. If it wasn't this dish, would be the next-best-thing on same premise: filling for Hunger meter, straightforward in execution. Why not wide food variety? Because, once more: simplicity - I don't play this game as a "cooking simulator" although I admit there's a "select few" tiny minority in such camp. And it's ok; variety-for-sake-of-variety should not be forced upon majority only looking to "go-by" via "junk food", just like irl (beg-to-disagree for real life, yet en masse habit). Cheers!

[hhh2]

a lot of recipes in the game are bad, so it's no wonder only a few get made again and again. I'm sure everybody knows the big 2 meatballs and perogies, and that's really all you need. Shame really, some of the dishes have cool recipes but super underwhelming stats. 

I think if the recipes were to get different stats, even just slightly, it'd help a lot. Most recipes give 37.5 hunger, 5 sanity, and 3-20 hp. The newer recipes feel more impactful, like surf and turf, jelly salad and beefy greens. Either some more unique stats, extra spoil time or both would help greatly (there are only like 5 recipes with 20+ day spoil time and one of them is perogies, why doesn't taffy last 40 days like honey???)

[Milordo]

Meatballs, Meaty stew, Bacon and eggs, Honey nuggets, Honey ham, Jelly salad, Beefy greens, Dragon pie, Fish sticks, Pierogi and my love Surf and Turf.

From all these dishes i always cook Meatballs, Meaty stew, Surf and Turf and Pierogi. The rest are situational and I may know some other recipes but that's all because the game is heavily unbalanced and doesn't incentivize into a variegate diet.

 

[Notecja]

They call me Warly.
I play Wendy/Woodie.
I cook in big bulks, like 40 dragonpies because local Womwood was a little crazy.
40 pierogi and 40 bacon and eggs - I was just clearing spider nests.
Nothing can stop me from making 40 honey hams, unless I am lazy.
Sometimes just because of reasons I will avoid what is best.

[Cloakingsumo198]

Meatballs, meaty stew, and pierogi are my go-to simply because I remember their recipe the easiest, always have their ingredients on hand and they solve my issues well enough.

But I always have bacon and eggs, fish sticks, surf n turf, ice cream, and honey ham in the back of my mind for when I actually have their ingredients or are making space in the fridge for fresher foods.

I dabble in some froggy bunwich, trail mix, or butter muffins early game when all I have is random bits and pieces. It's helpful for warly and impresses the noobs with your culinary skills, also keeps them alive.

I also constantly make mistakes...

Spoiler

Fruit medley, fist full of jam, stuffed eggplant, fish tacos, kabobs, ratatouille, monster lasagna, wet goop....

Such things happen but never by choice.

I used to make taffy by the stacks but I haven't started a bee farm in ages.

[GenomeSquirrel]

Meatball, Perogi, Fish Sticks, Meaty Stew, Butter Muffin, Bacon and Eggs honey ham, chicken nuggets

It’s rare I’ll make anything else.

[Dextops]

4 hours ago, hhh2 said:

a lot of recipes in the game are bad, so it's no wonder only a few get made again and again. I'm sure everybody knows the big 2 meatballs and perogies, and that's really all you need. Shame really, some of the dishes have cool recipes but super underwhelming stats. 

the problem with these recipes is that these 2 recipes you mentioned kinda suck and it is sad a lot of players don't grow out of it because they hear that they are really good

[Cap0319]

I think knowing as much recipes as possible is only really useful as Warly as other characters can get by with only knowing 5 or so dishes. Still its always nice to have options even if they might not be the most efficient.

[Astraia]

I am (was) a Wurt main, I'm no big fan of meatballs when playing as her.

Of course, playing as other characters, I'd say they're efficient and are a great food source, monster meat is easily obtainable and when winter arrives, I'll have plenty of crockpots and ice will be plentiful

1 hour ago, Cap0319 said:

I think knowing as much recipes as possible is only really useful as Warly as other characters can get by with only knowing 5 or so dishes. Still its always nice to have options even if they might not be the most efficient.

IS IT YOU? FROM XBOX? AGH

[Cap0319]

1 minute ago, NightfallsCurse said:

IS IT YOU? FROM XBOX? AGH

Maybe...

[Astraia]

Just now, Cap0319 said:

Maybe...

I'll take it as a yes 

[hhh2]

2 hours ago, Dextops said:

the problem with these recipes is that these 2 recipes you mentioned kinda suck and it is sad a lot of players don't grow out of it because they hear that they are really good

what? perogies are a don't starve staple, it's the main reason people get a birdcage. What are you even supposed to replace them with later? Meatballs are 100% still the best hunger food, yes I know honey ham/bacon eggs is better but they also aren't as hunger efficent. Come on at least give examples of what you mean.

[Astraia]

2 hours ago, Dextops said:

the problem with these recipes is that these 2 recipes you mentioned kinda suck and it is sad a lot of players don't grow out of it because they hear that they are really good

I have no idea what you're talking about, If I still played dst, I would still mass-produce these, but I haven't browsed DST forums in a while, I've become part of OffTopicClan---oops, forgot this isn't Warriors

[Dextops]

Just now, hhh2 said:

what? perogies are a don't starve staple. What are you even supposed to replace them with later? Meatballs are 100% still the best hunger food, yes I know honey ham/bacon eggs is better but they also aren't as hunger efficent. Come on at least give examples of what you mean.

meatballs are incredibly hunger inefficient unless made with ice and it isn't worth it to specifically farm monster meat. The other 2 recipes are way more efficient having a much better stat spread and are easily more mass producible than meatballs. as for healing a more specific recipe hinders it especially when jelly beans can easily be rushed with cheese methods and even if you swore off cheesing blue caps are a lot more easily obtainable 

[hhh2]

1 minute ago, Dextops said:

meatballs are incredibly hunger inefficient unless made with ice and it isn't worth it to specifically farm monster meat. The other 2 recipes are way more efficient having a much better stat spread and are easily more mass producible than meatballs. as for healing a more specific recipe hinders it especially when jelly beans can easily be rushed with cheese methods and even if you swore off cheesing blue caps are a lot more easily obtainable 

jelly beans come from bee queen and can't be farmed quickly, that's like me saying armor is useless just rush ancient fuelweaver twice. blue caps are kinda hard to find unless you go to the caves, and it's not like they don't have downsides, the sanity penatly is well, pretty punishing if you need a lot of healing for a boss fight, so you'd need cactus or green caps too. perogies can be made with any vegtable, red caps, carrots, cactus, etc... give a ton of healing and don't have any downsides.

1 monster meat + 3 ice/berries is too good to pass up and it was even cheaper when you could make it with a morsel instead.

[Dextops]

Just now, hhh2 said:

jelly beans come from bee queen and can't be farmed quickly, that's like me saying armor is useless just rush ancient fuelweaver twice. blue caps are kinda hard to find unless you go to the caves, and it's not like they don't have downsides, the sanity penatly is well, pretty punishing if you need a lot of healing for a boss fight, so you'd need cactus or green caps too. perogies can be made with any vegtable, red caps, carrots, cactus, etc... give a ton of healing and don't have any downsides.

1 monster meat + 3 ice/berries is too good to pass up and it was even cheaper when you could make it with a morsel instead.

one beequeen kill should give you enough healing until the next kill and blue caps make up for anything in between. Your second statement is contradicted by your next remark. You should be going into caves for light bulbs and there is no reason to not get blue caps with you

also for your last sentence might i suggest volt goat pens? give way too much meat to not make meaty stews, and you should already be making bee boxes because of how good they are. In fact cut out the middle man and just fist honey down your mouth if it ever comes to it.

[SecretPizzaMan]

5 minutes ago, hhh2 said:

jelly beans come from bee queen and can't be farmed quickly, that's like me saying armor is useless just rush ancient fuelweaver twice. blue caps are kinda hard to find unless you go to the caves, and it's not like they don't have downsides, the sanity penatly is well, pretty punishing if you need a lot of healing for a boss fight, so you'd need cactus or green caps too. perogies can be made with any vegtable, red caps, carrots, cactus, etc... give a ton of healing and don't have any downsides.

1 monster meat + 3 ice/berries is too good to pass up and it was even cheaper when you could make it with a morsel instead.

Bee queen gives 1800 to 2100 points of healing per kill. 1 stack of pierogi gives you 1600 healing. This is a lot, so unless you are face tanking every single mob in your way then you don't need to worry about healing as long as you have jellybeans. 

Meatballs are overrated, the only reason I make them is because I am lazy. Otherwise I would be making meaty stew or bacon and eggs for the better stats.

[hhh2]

1 minute ago, SecretPizzaMan said:

Meatballs are overrated

meatballs are forever and always, even if it is just for the lazyness thing you mentioned.

 

8 minutes ago, Dextops said:

also for your last sentence might i suggest volt goat pens? give way too much meat to not make meaty stews, and you should already be making bee boxes because of how good they are. In fact cut out the middle man and just fist honey down your mouth if it ever comes to it.

I mean, these are kinda later game in DST, especially if you are playing alone. I barely have enough time to kill klaus in the first winter + farm mactusks, moving goats takes forever! I do do the honey thing but it's pretty expensive 8 honey per day is not cheap. I just think it's easier to mine some ice since almost everything in this game drops some kind of meat, even if it's just the ocasional hound wave.

[Dextops]

7 minutes ago, hhh2 said:

meatballs are forever and always, even if it is just for the lazyness thing you mentioned.

 

I mean, these are kinda later game in DST, especially if you are playing alone. I barely have enough time to kill klaus in the first winter + farm mactusks, moving goats takes forever! I do do the honey thing but it's pretty expensive 8 honey per day is not cheap. I just think it's easier to mine some ice since almost everything in this game drops some kind of meat, even if it's just the ocasional hound wave.

yeah it does come to skill level but that is just my point. Once you start getting better at the game you shouldn't be using those recipes just because people say they are good. A lot of what i mentioned is not something everything everyone can do but just doing 2 or of 3 things (ex1: killing beequeen and making a volt goat farm or pig farm both manage well enough but volt goat farms are better for pure meat. Ex 2: setting up at least 3 bee boxes and one of the meat farms.) just doing 2 of these things before autumn or even just before spring if you're having trouble can help you enough to get all your health and hunger problems underway just takes some practice but of course move at your own pace just remember to one day make the switch

 

Spoiler

also for making goat herds you can just use telelocators to make an infinite amount of herds you don't need to transport them manually

 

[Theukon-dos]

1 hour ago, SecretPizzaMan said:

Bee queen gives 1800 to 2100 points of healing per kill. 1 stack of pierogi gives you 1600 healing. This is a lot, so unless you are face tanking every single mob in your way then you don't need to worry about healing as long as you have jellybeans. 

 

1 hour ago, Dextops said:

as for healing a more specific recipe hinders it especially when jelly beans can easily be rushed with cheese methods and even if you swore off cheesing blue caps are a lot more easily obtainable 

Do you two realize what you're saying? Bee Queen is the single hardest boss for solo players, save for maybe Crab King. Sure, you might get a lot of returns, but that's still one hell of a challenge, and some people don't like using cheese. And as the last guy said, blue caps drain a lot of sanity.

And y'know what? Even if someone does use Jellybeans as their main source of healing, that's still bad. Jellybeans restore 120 HP, 75% health for most characters. Y'know what that means? It means that if you're not letting yourself dip super low on health, then you're going to be losing out on a ton of health from the jellybeans. Mess up your kiting pattern against a tallbird and go down to 100 HP? Welp, either suck it up, or waste 80 health from eating a jellybean. Saying that Pierogis are bad Because Jellybeans are MVP (Which they are, not denying that). Is downright tone deaf at best. 

 

Speaking of Pierogis, And in turn Meatballs. I think this poll and most comments here really demonstrate how the hunger system in Don't Starve is fundamentally broken.

 

See, it is entirely accurate to say that these recipes; particularly meatballs; are inefficient. 

 

However.

 

In Don't starve, the hunger system exists purely as a meter. Unless you're playing Warly, all you have to do is eat food, and the meter goes up. This means that all you have to do in order to manage the hunger mechanic is have a reliable source of any food.

And this is where meatballs come in.

As said before, it is true that Meatballs are inefficient. Making them with 1 Monster Meat and 3 berries only gives about a carrot's worth of hunger compared to just eating those three things cooked and on their own. However, it's also comically easy to make. The Monster Meat can be sourced from a spider den which is practically free to relocate to your base. And Berries are easy to transplant just by using a shovel. You can easily and cheaply get an infinite supply of meatballs in about 10-15 minutes. And by that point, you've won. The hunger bar has been entirely neutralized with 2 basic farms. There are some food sources that might have an advantage, such as Honey with it's long shelf life or barnacles with their unique and efficient farming. But ultimately, you can go through the entire game with nothing but a spider den and berry bushes while never worrying about hunger again.

 

This same principal applies to healing aswell. You use an item that increases the meter, and the meter goes up with very few caveats.

Looking at the recipe for Pierogi, you need 1 meat, 1 egg, and 1 veggie. We already have a spider farm for the meat requirement. And because a Bird Cage can convert Monster Meat into Eggs at a 1-1 ratio with no penelty, that's 2 of the 3 requirements down with a single farm that cost nothing to set up. This only leads the vegetable. This vegetable has no limitations on what it can be, and only requires that vegetable be in there, not any specific amount. That means we could choose anything from kelp, stonefruit, mushrooms, carrots, ect. ect. And we have our pierogis. And like last time, we've won. We don't need anything else to sustain our health stat, even if there are options that could be seen as "Better".  After all, why bother farming; say, 180 HP worth of Waffles or Fig-stuffed trunks when you can farm 400+ HP worth of Pierogis in half the time.

 

So once again, these are why these recipes are so commononly used. They may not be the most efficient recipes, but they require so little time and set up to make, and there's no significant advantage to moving on from them.

 

As an example of a food system that doesn't fall into this trap. Let's look at another game, Valheim.

On the surface, food in Valheim and Don't Starve is rather similar. Both games have you scavenge and farm food. And you can combine these foods to make better foods at a crock pot/cauldron. The main difference is that Valheim doesn't follow the traditional hunger system in games. Instead, your stomach can hold 3 different meals, and these meals temporarily raise your maximum health and stamina. And to understand why this is important, I want to look at 3 dishes.

Raspberries

Blueberries

And Queen's jam.

Raspberries and Blueberries are self-explanatory. They're berries that you can find and eating them gives stats.

Raspberries raise your health by 7 and your stamina by 20, while Blueberries raise your Health by 8 and your stamina by 25. 

Queen's Jam, on the other hand, is a combination of Raspberries and Blueberries, and raise your health by 14 and your stamina by 40. So immediately, you can see that eating a queen's jam is less effective than eating a raspberry and a blueberry individually. This becomes more apparent when you realize that it takes 8 raspberries and 6 blueberries to make 4 jam. Meaning you've effectively halved the stat output by making jam.

 

However, as I said before, you can only eat upto 3 different dishes. So while a rasp and blueberry give more stats, they take up 2/3s of your stomach. While replacing them with a single Queen's Jam means that you can replace them with another, more effective meal.

 

Now, I'm not saying that DST should be more like Valheim. Valheim is less survival focused and more combat/progression focused. I just wanted to give an example to show that there are ways to encourage players to collect rarer/more expensive foods. but Don't Starve doesn't do this. Hence why Meatballs and Pierogi are so prominent.

 

[Dextops]

39 minutes ago, Theukon-dos said:

Do you two realize what you're saying? Bee Queen is the single hardest boss for solo players, save for maybe Crab King. Sure, you might get a lot of returns, but that's still one hell of a challenge, and some people don't like using cheese. And as the last guy said, blue caps drain a lot of sanity.

And y'know what? Even if someone does use Jellybeans as their main source of healing, that's still bad. Jellybeans restore 120 HP, 75% health for most characters. Y'know what that means? It means that if you're not letting yourself dip super low on health, then you're going to be losing out on a ton of health from the jellybeans. Mess up your kiting pattern against a tallbird and go down to 100 HP? Welp, either suck it up, or waste 80 health from eating a jellybean. Saying that Pierogis are bad Because Jellybeans are MVP (Which they are, not denying that). Is downright tone deaf at best. 

 

I don’t think personal philosophies should be taken into account when talking about how good something is but even then, blue caps don’t come with many downsides other than a sanity decrease which can be dealt with by cooking them. Bee queen can still be rushed in first autumn though she doesn’t  have to even in later seasons just somewhere in the first year is good enough and with that you can keep cycling her. As for hunger my argument still applies. Also no one relies solely on jelly beans that is why blue caps exist and are a much better method than pierogis. Having a shovel and going into caves gives a lot more benefit than trying to make.

finally you’re missing my entire argument: as you get better at the game you should not rely on these dishes that get outclassed later on. Just because someone says they are good doesn’t mean they are good. If you’re a newer player go ahead and use them but later on into your play time don’t rely solely on them

48 minutes ago, Theukon-dos said:

So once again, these are why these recipes are so commononly used. They may not be the most efficient recipes, but they require so little time and set up to make, and there's no significant advantage to moving on from them.

 

You just stated yourself why moving on is a good thing, because in your own words they are not the most efficient recipes 

[Theukon-dos]

5 minutes ago, Dextops said:

I don’t think personal philosophies should be taken into account when talking about how good something is

Fair enough.

5 minutes ago, Dextops said:

but even then, blue caps don’t come with many downsides other than a sanity decrease which can be dealt with by cooking them.

You do realize that cooked blue caps hurt you, right? This method both makes them less efficient for healing, and over doubles the quantity of blue caps that you need.

5 minutes ago, Dextops said:

Bee queen can still be rushed in first autumn though she doesn’t  have to even in later seasons just somewhere in the first year is good enough and with that you can keep cycling her.

I repeat myself. Hardest solo boss in the game. The only time I've ever killed QB myself was with a modded item that hard countered her.

5 minutes ago, Dextops said:

As for hunger my argument still applies. Also no one relies solely on jelly beans that is why blue caps exist and are a much better method than pierogis. Having a shovel and going into caves gives a lot more benefit than trying to make.

1. They still drop sanity

2. Why the hell are you using a shovel? They can't regrow if you dig them up.

5 minutes ago, Dextops said:

finally you’re missing my entire argument: as you get better at the game you should not rely on these dishes that get outclassed later on. Just because someone says they are good doesn’t mean they are good. If you’re a newer player go ahead and use them but later on into your play time don’t rely solely on them

You just stated yourself why moving on is a good thing, because in your own words they are not the most efficient recipes 

No. This is exactly the point I'm trying to make. Efficiency does not matter. 

If I can choose between infinite meatballs and infinite Bacon and eggs, then the meatballs are going to be just as effective as the Bacon and Eggs because there are no benefits that getting an extra 10 hunger/click would net me.

Getting meatballs set up is much easier than getting Bacon and Eggs set up, and by that point, there is 0 practical difference between 300 hunger worth of meatballs and 300 hunger worth of Bacon and Eggs.

[Terra B Welch]

I just thought, the thread title to me makes it look like OP just think everyone does this.

(When in reality it's a genuine thread about peoples prefered food items in DST.)