Free-to-play Cooking training

See also: Pay-to-play Cooking training

Cooking level table

This is a cropped table indicating what can be achieved starting at certain levels. It only covers items efficient for training Cooking.

Minimum level	Food	Experience	Notes
1	Shrimps, Meat, Chicken. Anchovies	30, 40, 30, 30	All these items are easily obtainable by fishing or killing beginner monsters. You can also pick up meat dropped by cows in the cow field in Lumbridge where many people train and leave meat lying around. Also, when you kill chickens for their meat, always pick up the feathers dropped by them.
15	Trout	70	Trout can be multi purposed. They can serve as mid level food, or as power levelling items for both Fishing and Cooking. You can also pick up trout from many power-fishers at the river near Barbarian Village. Power-cooking trout is a popular way of levelling Cooking in free-to-play.
20	Pike	80	Pike are generally harder to fish, expensive, and yield a low amount of experience.
25	Salmon	90	Salmon can be used for mid level food and are mainly obtained by fly fishing above level 30 Fishing or you can pick them up at the barbarian village where power fishers drop them.
30	Apple pie	130	Apple pie can be made as mid level food. However, 32 Cooking is needed to enter the Cooks' Guild to make these pies in bulk.
30	Tuna	100	Tuna can be used as mid-level food. They are very popular for training Cooking since power-fishers (mostly at Musa Point) often drop them ready to be picked up and cooked, creating a free source to train Cooking quickly. Cooked tuna also has a constant demand, sometimes higher than its raw counterpart.
32	Cooks' Guild	N/A	The Cooks' Guild is a good place to train Cooking by making jugs of wine and apple pies, as it provides materials sufficient to make them.
35	Pizza	143	Cooked pizza can be used as food. They should not be sold, but kept for adding toppings later on.
35	Jug of wine	200	Jugs of wine are the fastest Cooking experience in the game for both F2P and members for power-levelling and are commonly used for Cooking training. Wine heals 11 hitpoints, but decreases the Attack stat when drank, limiting their use to Ranged/Magic combat and other dangerous non-combat activities. Because of these reasons together, wine is the cheapest food in the game. You may enter the Cooks' Guild to make free wine, since there are jugs, grapes, and water.
40	Lobster	120	Lobsters can be cooked as mid-high level food. Cooked lobster can sometimes be sold for more than its raw counterpart.
45	Swordfish	140	Swordfish can be cooked as mid-high level food, giving the highest healing rate for free players in a single bite. As with all fish it is consumed in one bite.
45	Meat pizza	(143+25)	Meat pizzas can be made merely by adding cooked meat on plain pizza. Raw meat is easily obtainable from killing giant rats, cows, and bears.
55	Anchovy pizza	(143+39)	Anchovy pizzas are made merely by adding cooked anchovies to plain pizza, making it heal the most in F2P worlds. It is sometimes possible to make a profit by mass buying plain cooked pizzas from Grand Exchange, adding anchovies onto them, and then selling them back them via the Grand Exchange. Cost of plain cooked pizza: −619 Cost of cooked Anchovies: −54 Price of Anchovy pizza: 750 Net-gain per Anchovy pizza assembled: 77

Training methods

Below are some training methods suitable for different kinds of players. You should start off by doing the quest Cook's Assistant, as this will get you to level 4.

Training alongside Fishing

This method is suitable for players wanting to train Cooking along with Fishing. If the player has at least 30 Cooking, 35 Fishing and has done Dragon Slayer I, they may want to choose the Corsair Cove Resource Area as a substitute place for training rather than at Karamja.

Level 1

Shrimp can be caught without any requirements. They yield 30 experience per successful cooking. Cooked shrimps can be sold in the Grand Exchange for little profit however, they should only be used for food. The best place to net shrimps is Draynor.

Level 20

Trout can be caught in Barbarian Village or in Lumbridge, provided you have level 20 Fishing. Trout are very handy and each of them give 70 experience. Power-cookers can even grab dropped raw trout from powerfishers and cook them. If you go to Barbarian Village on a populated world, there are usually people giving away free raw trout and salmon.

Level 30

Tuna can be caught at Musa Point in Karamja by harpooning them at level 35 Fishing. Tuna yields 100 experience each successful cook, though the catching speed is slow. The dropped raw tunas from powerfishers can be taken to cook. If a player decides to use this method to train Cooking, a very busy world should be selected. There is no permanent cooking location so bring an axe and tinderbox to use on the trees by the dock.

Level 40

Lobsters can be caught at Musa Point in Karamja at level 40 Fishing. Lobster yields 120 experience each cooking and catching speed is comparable to harpooning. There are rarely any lobster drops from powerfishers, thus fishing them yourself is better.

Level 45/50

Swordfish can be caught in Musa Point in Karamja once level 50 Fishing is attained. Swordfish yields 140 experience each cooking. However, swordfish catching speed is the slowest among all free-to-play fish, because tuna are also caught while harpooning. While swordfish can be cooked starting at level 45, a higher Cooking level is recommended before starting to cook swordfish, as the chances of successfully cooking them are relatively low at lower Cooking levels.

Alternate method to level without burning food

This is an alternate method to level Cooking without burning fish, using the highest-level food possible such that they cannot be burned; however, it will most likely be slower than the method suggested above. It is recommended to use the other methods to attain level 50 Cooking before beginning.

Fish		Start level	End level	Number of fish	Price of uncooked fish	Price of cooked fish	Profit/Loss (overall)	Price per uncooked fish	Price per cooked fish	Profit/Loss per fish
	Trout	50	58	1760	161,920	75,680	−86,240	92	43	−49
	Salmon	58	64	2029	150,146	158,262	8,116	74	78	4
	Tuna	64	74	6893	406,687	813,374	406,687	59	118	59
	Lobster	74	86	20846	1,542,604	3,293,668	1,751,064	74	158	84
	Swordfish	86	99	67405	6,605,690	10,919,610	4,313,920	98	162	64
Totals				98933	8,867,047	15,260,594	6,393,547

Another method is to cook pizza from the level you're able to cook them all the way to 99. It is better experience than swordfish (143 vs 140), however, 3 steps are required to make them, making the hourly experience rate lower than swordfish. The prices change constantly, so check the prices before selling the pizzas.

Training in the Cooks' Guild

Please note, 32 Cooking is needed to enter the Cooks' Guild. You cannot enter the guild without getting a chef's hat.

Level 32

Although apple pies can be made at level 30 Cooking, only the Cooks' Guild has free and fairly abundant resources for mass-producing them. One jug, pot, pie dish and three cooking apple spawns are available in the guild. The process of making pies can be sped up if players bring their own jugs and pots prior. Wheat can be harvested in the field directly behind the guild, then made into flour using the mill. Collecting flour, water and mixing pastry dough can all be done on the ground floor^[UK]1^st floor^[US], then cooked using the ranges on the 1^st floor^[UK]2^nd floor^[US], while obtaining more equipment from the 2^nd floor^[UK]3^rd floor^[US].

Level 35

Jugs and grapes can also be found inside the guild. Wine can be fermented within the guild by filling jugs with water from the sink on the ground floor, then using grapes on the jugs of water. Wine gives the highest Cooking experience per success, though grape spawning is slow. Nothing is needed to be brought prior. This method of training is somewhat expensive, but can give up to 2,800 experience per inventory (14 grapes/14 jugs of water).

Training with complex food

Complex food requires time to make and can initially be a bit costly, but can be very rewarding. Complex food basically has varied trips, ranging from Draynor to Wilderness. It is possible to power-level these kinds of food, simply by purchasing the final uncooked version of the food (an uncooked pie, for example) from the Grand Exchange, or trading with another player. This method is usually quite expensive, but in turn offers very fast experience.

Level 10

Redberry pies are the first complex food that can be made. As these pies serve no purpose at higher levels, a quick method shall be shown here. The supplies such as buckets or jugs can be bought from a general store, but it's best to obtain the berries from the bushes south-east of Varrock, straight north from the entrance to Al Kharid. After that, redberry pies can be made in bulk. This pie is one of the easiest to make due to the low level requirement, and often the most expensive one to sell in the Grand Exchange, possibly due to its quest use. Using the Cooks' Guild and bushes located on the outskirts of Varrock, a decent profit can be made, however the experience given is low compared to other cooking processes.

Level 20

Meat pies can be similarly to redberry pies, and a variety of different uncooked meats may be cooked into cooked meat. Raw beef is more efficient so you should kill cows and bank the raw beef.

Level 25

Stews can be made by picking potatoes in the potato field between Lumbridge and Varrock (directly north of the Lumbridge cow farm) and killing the cows for raw beef. Bowls can be taken from the kitchen of Lumbridge Castle, purchased from general stores or the Grand Exchange, or manufactured with the Crafting skill (requires level 8 Crafting).

Level 35

Plain pizza can be made from one tomato, one cheese and one pizza base; the pizza base can be made by using a pot of flour with a jug of water or bought from Fat Tony in the Bandit Camp (Wilderness) for 4 coins each. To ensure quick buying of pizza bases, exactly 51 coins can be brought to buy exactly 10 pizza bases and 145 coins to buy 28 pizza bases, and immediately move to and from the bank. Due to the personal shop update, the respawn rate of shop supply is low and players might choose to make the pizza bases themselves or wait. Cheese and tomatoes can be taken from Aggie's house or Fat Tony's camp, but both of them have disadvantages. Draynor lacks a support of cooking ranges, and Fat Tony is in the Wilderness which means players are at risk of being attacked by other players. Bandits are also aggressive, meaning that lower-levelled players must take care if they choose to train with pizzas in the Wilderness. Cooking pizzas at the range in Al Kharid can earn up to 180,000 experience per hour.

Level 55

Anchovy pizza can be made. Making an anchovy pizza out of plain pizza and anchovies is always a success. Raw anchovies can be fished south of Lumbridge, in Al Kharid and in Draynor.

Making jugs of wine

Jugs of wine can be made starting at 35 cooking, providing the fastest Cooking experience in the game for free-to-play, topping out at 470,000–490,000 experience per hour at level 68. Wine is not created at a range or fire; instead, players can combine a bundle of grapes with a jug of water in their inventory, creating an unfermented wine. After 12 seconds, the unfermented wine ferments into a jug of wine, granting 200 experience. If a new unfermented wine is made before the 12 seconds are up, the timer will reset back to 12 seconds, so experience for all the wine will be awarded at once 12 seconds after completely stopping the process of making wine. Before level 68 Cooking, there is also a chance to create a jug of bad wine instead depending on level, granting no experience.

62,147 jugs of wine are required to go from 68 to 99 Cooking. Jugs of water and grapes can be bought en masse from the Grand Exchange and combined together at any bank.

Total Jugs of water/Grapes needed	Price of Jugs of water	Price of Grapes	Total Cost	Price per Jugs of water	Price per Grapes	Cost per Wine
62,147	2,237,292	1,180,793	−3,169,497	36	19	−51

Profitability

Players wishing to know the profits of cooking certain foods should consult the related calculators, such as Calculator:Cooking/Fish for profits from fish, and Cooking/Burn level to see what level different foods stop being burned.

Fish, particularly the high level ones, play a big role in the cooking market. They make up the bulk of the food market, with high demands for both raw and cooked forms. Note that buying fish raw from the Grand Exchange and selling the cooked product in the Grand Exchange is not always profitable due to many players buying mass amounts of fish to get to 99 Cooking. For many fish there is often a price difference between cooked and raw fish.

A way to train Cooking and gain a profit would be to make foods containing many steps. These foods give much more experience than fish when made from scratch, many cannot be burnt, and can be sold for modest profit in the Grand Exchange. The downside to this method is that it takes much longer to prepare the ingredients for combining.

Training locations

Some places are more suited for cooking than others. Here are some recommended places.

Location	Distance from range/fire	Optimal food	Notes
Grand Exchange	Immediate	Power levelling	The Grand Exchange is one of the only banks in Gielinor that allows you to make fires one tile away from the bank clerk. This makes it the fastest place to cook food that can be cooked on a fire in free-to-play (i.e. fish). Grab 26 fish, a tinderbox, and a log you can burn, then step one tile away from the bank clerk and light a fire, then cook at it. This requires you to have one log to burn for every 26 fish you want to cook, but provides bonus Firemaking experience at no cost to your Cooking experience speed. Make sure to use the banks on the east side of the Grand Exchange, so that after lighting your fire you walk back directly in front of the bank clerk without any delay from walking. Alternatively, players often train Firemaking at the Grand Exchange, so you can use other player's fires instead, though they may go out in the middle of cooking or be further from the bank clerk. This is also the most convenient area to power level with jugs of wine, as they can be bought en masse from the clerk.
Falador PVP bank	Very short	Power levelling	This is the closest bank to a range in F2P. On the PVP world, a bank is added to White Knights' Castle in Falador, which is very close to the ranges within the castle. Even with 1 Agility, you will never run out of run energy training here, making it one of the fastest and most profitable places to train (because you will not need to use energy potions to keep running). Be very careful not to take anything valuable out of the safe zone in White Knights' Castle (for example when taking a trip to the Grand Exchange to buy more raw fish), as other players can Snare and kill you almost anywhere on PVP worlds. Dying while cooking however is only a minor inconvenience, as all you will lose is some time to teleport/walk back and a single inventory of food. There are no nearby fishing spots.
Draynor Village	Very short	Shrimp and Anchovies or Power levelling	With the Forestry update a persistent fire was added in front of the Friendly Forester making this one of the fastest fires in F2P at 17 tiles away and 1 click to and from the fire or bank. The nearest range is in Draynor Manor You can cook on the fireplace inside Ned's house. The fireplace has the same burn rate as a regular fire, not a range. The fireplace can cook any meat, fish, or seafood.
Lumbridge bank	Very short	Lured, netted	The logs which respawn next to the bank on the roof of Lumbridge castle are a very fast place to cook. Just take out 27 fish at a time with a tinderbox and light one of the two logs against the western side of the roof, alternating between them, and cook your fish at it. This also saves an inventory spot since you don't have to take out your own logs from the bank, allowing you to cook one extra fish compared to simply lighting your own fire. There is also a special range in the kitchen on the ground floor[UK]1st floor[US] of Lumbridge castle which requires finishing Cook's Assistant to access. Cooking here has a lower chance of burning food than cooking on a normal range or fire.
Al Kharid bank	Very short	Power levelling	This bank is second closest to a range among everywhere in F2P worlds (closest that isn't on a PVP world), and has no doors or anything that could block you, which can reduce time taken to cook an inventory. However, depending on your Agility level, you may slowly lose run energy training here and eventually have to walk instead of sprinting. The only fishing spots nearby are basic small net/bait spots.
Edgeville bank	Very short	Lured fish	There is a range right by the bank in Doris's house. (However, Doris is a members-only NPC, so the house is empty.) It is also a popular place to train Firemaking, which means that there will be plenty of fires around to cook on if the player wishes for faster runs. (Note: the house that contains the range has a door that automatically closes occasionally.)
Varrock east bank	Very short	Power levelling	The eastern Varrock bank has a cooking range located just to the south-west. The house is empty and the bank is within clicking distance making trips very fast.
Varrock west bank	Very short	Power levelling	There are two ranges located outside the west walls of Varrock. One at the main level of Juliet's house, and the alternate would be at Gertrude's house. The closest fishing area is Barbarian Village which is rather far from the cooking area. It is advised to have raw food prepared in the bank. The advantages of this cooking area is the relatively short distance to the Grand Exchange, as well as access to Varrock's west bank.
Barbarian Village fishing spots	Very short	Lured fish	Players can catch trout/salmon or pick up dropped trout and salmon commonly dropped by other players and use the permanent fire located right at the fishing spots to cook the fish.
Corsair Cove Resource Area	Short (permanent campfire)	Tuna, lobsters and swordfish	Requires completion of Dragon Slayer I. There is a permanent campfire south of the area, where Lord Marshal Brogan and Altarkiz are. Players will usually also provide fires by burning the logs they have cut from the trees. If players are looking to bank their food, they need to keep in mind that The Corsair Curse has to be completed in order to use the bank a distance away. Players are advised to keep run mode on when travelling to the bank.
Musa Point spot	Very long	Tuna, lobsters and swordfish	Musa spot is the most popular place for free players to catch tuna, lobsters, and swordfish, which is a major source of Cooking experience. Fire must be manually made by cutting logs (at the entrance to the Musa Point) and lit with a tinderbox, or other players might do it instead. In busy worlds, fires are usually lit by other players. The cooked fish generally have lower value and are not recommended to be sold to the general store. They can be banked at a bank deposit box located in Port Sarim and subsequently sold to other players or used as reliable food. To maximise the experience rate, players can login to a very busy world, take raw fish on the ground and cook them, trade to give away to players (the best way), or eat/drop them.
Gerrant's Fishy Business	Very short	Sardine	Gerrant's Fishy Business in Port Sarim stocks 200 Raw Sardines for 10 coins each with a rapid restock time, making it a readily available supply of low level fish to cook for a low cost. Fires can be lit indoors using logs from the trees outside, allowing for both the purchase and cooking of the Sardines in extremely close proximity.