Crafting your way from the stone age to rifles and carbon-composite armor is hungry work, and you’ll need to make sure you keep your belly full while prospecting. In this guide, we’ll go over the basics of finding and processing food, and list all of the foods currently available in ICARUS.
First Foods
Berries & Vegetables
When you first land on ICARUS, you’ll be able to harvest Berries from bushes in the Forest biome. These fill your food as well as your Water meter, and are a great way to tide yourself over until you can do some hunting. There are other edible plants, though many need to be cooked over a fire in order to unlock their full benefits (see food list).
Note that depending on your draw-distance settings and your graphics card, Berry Bushes may be indistinguishable from other bushes until you get fairly close to them. Plants like Watermelon and Pumpkin lie flat on the ground, so you’ll need to pay close attention in order to find them if they’re in amongst bushes.
Meat and Fish
Once you’ve crafted yourself a Bow and some Arrows, you’ll be able to take down Icarus’ animals instead of subsisting on berries. Smaller animals like rabbits and racoons go down in only one arrow, as do baby deer. Larger creatures require a headshot, a stealth attack, or both — land a headshot while crouched to ensure you take down medium deer and other larger herbivores in one arrow, otherwise they’ll run away. Lakes are another good source of food, since fish are easy targets. You can also try to take on wolves, assuming they’re alone. Have a knife crafted and ready to go as well, since it’s much easier to deal the finishing blow in melee (the wolf will attack you once you start rudely shooting arrows at it).
You can eat raw meat and raw fish, but cooking it provides additional benefits and makes it significantly more filling.
How to Cook
Basic Cooking – Meat and Fish
Until there’s a Prospector perk that allows you to eat raw meat and raw vegetables, you’ll have to cook what you hunt and gather to make it edible. This can be done at a Campfire, or in a Fireplace once you’ve reached Planetary Tech Tier 2. Open the Campfire/Fireplace’s inventory, and place your raw meat in one of the available slots. Then put fuel in the fuel slot (this can be wood, fiber, sticks, or coal), and click the “Activate” button to begin cooking.
Basic Meals – Cooking Station & Potbelly Stove
Once you reach Tier 2 (the Crafting Bench) you’ll be able to craft a Cooking Station. The cooking station will allow you to craft simple meals, like the Fruit Salad and Wild Salad — these meals offer significantly bigger bonuses than foods cooked at a campfire. It’s also where you create Animal Fat, which is a component in some advanced recipes. The Potbelly Stove allows for even more complex and beneficial meals than the Cooking Station, but these meals require harder-to-collect ingredients.
Advanced Meals
Once you’ve teched up to Tier 3 (the Machining Bench) you’ll be able to craft the Kitchen Bench and its attachment, the Biofuel Stove. The Kitchen Bench allows you to craft Pastry and Bread Dough, while the Biofuel Stove has recipes for a number of advanced meals. These meals give big boosts to your stats, and even offer significant bonuses to XP gain while you digest them.
How to Make Bread
Bread is significantly more involved than cooking meat: You’ll need a Mortar and Pestle to create Flour from Wheat, and then a Kitchen Bench to combine your Flour with Yeast to create Bread Dough. Bread Dough can then be cooked in a Biofuel Stove to create Bread. You can also make Flatbread Dough instead if you don’t have any Yeast.
How to Stop Food From Spoiling
While it’s in your inventory, you can stop food from spoiling by eating one item from the stack. This resets the spoilage meter of the entire stack. Note that when food is in a stack, only the top item spoils, not the whole stack. Once one item spoils, that item turns to spoiled food and the spoilage meter of the stack resets.
For food you want to store at your shelter, you’ll need to tech up to an Ice Box or Refrigerator to prevent food from spoiling.
Food List
The following foods are currently available in Icarus. You’ll need specific crafting tables or materials to create many of them — foods have therefore been organized by where they can be crafted.
A Campfire or Fireplace is used to cook any hunted/foraged foods that are cookable.
Food | Effects | Duration | Misc |
---|---|---|---|
Berries | +4 Food +50 Max Health | 600 | Ingredient in Fruit Pie |
Watermelon | +50 Food +50 Max Stamina | 600 | Ingredient in Fruit Pie |
Squash | +20 Food +10% Max Health | 60 | Cook to create Roast Squash. Ingredient in Roast Vegetables |
Pumpkin | +20 Food +10% Max Health | 60 | Cook to create Grilled Pumpkin. |
Carrot | +20 Food +10% Max Health | 60 | Cook to create Barbeque Carrot. |
Corn | +20 Food +10% Max Health | 60 | Cook to create Charred Corn. Ingredient in Vegetable Pie. |
Mature Coconut | +10 Food +50 Max Health | 600 | Ripens from Ripe Coconut |
Mushroom | +20 Food +10% Max Health | 60 | Ingredient in Mushroom Soup, Stew, Meat Pie |
Raw Fish | +20 Food +10% Max Health | 60 | Cook to create Cooked Fish. |
Raw Meat | +20 Food +10% Max Health | 60 | Cook to create Cooked Meat. Ingredient in Stew, Meat Pie. |
Raw Prime Meat | +20 Food +10% Max Health | 60 | Cook to create Cooked Prime Meat. |
Young Coconut | +2 Food +25 Max Health | 600 | Ripens into Ripe Coconut |
Food | Effects | Duration | Required Elements |
---|---|---|---|
Barbeque Carrot | +50 Food +75 Max Stamina | 600 | Carrot (1) |
Charred Corn | +50 Food +75 Max Stamina | 600 | Corn (1) |
Cooked Fish | +80 Food +100 Max Health | 600 | Raw Fish (1) |
Cooked Meat | +80 Food +100 Max Health | 600 | Raw Meat (1) |
Cooked Prime Meat | +150 Food +10 Max Stamina | 600 | Raw Prime Meat (1) |
Flatbread | +50 Food +10% Health Regen | 1200 | Flatbread Dough (1) |
Grilled Pumpkin | +50 Food +75 Max Stamina | 600 | Pumpkin (1) |
Mushroom Soup | +50 Food +75 Max Health | 600 | Water, Mushroom (5) |
Roast Squash | +50 Food +75 Max Stamina | 600 | Squash (1) |
Note that the Cooking Station is also where Animal Fat can be crafted.
Food | Effects | Duration | Required Elements |
---|---|---|---|
Creamed Corn | +100 Food +75 Maximum Stamina | 900 | Water, Animal Fat (1), Corn (1) |
Fruit Salad | +100 Food +75 Maximum Stamina | 900 | Watermelon (1), Berries (1) |
Wild Salad | +100 Food +150 Maximum Stamina | 900 | Pumpkin (1), Squash (1) |
Food | Effects | Duration | Required Elements |
---|---|---|---|
Cooked Prime Meat | +150 Food +10 Max Stamina | 600 | Raw Prime Meat (1) |
Fish Curry | +100 Food +225 Max Health | 900 | Animal Fat (1), Soy Bean (5), Raw Fish (1) |
Roast Vegetables | +100 Food +225 Maximum Stamina | 900 | Pumpkin (1), Squash (1), Carrot (1) |
Soy Bean Stir Fry | +100 Food +150 Max Health | 900 | Carrot (1), Mushroom (5), Soy Bean (5) |
Stew | +100 Food +150 Maximum Health | 900 | Mushroom (5), Carrot (1), Raw Meat (1) |
Sweetcorn Soup | +100 Food +75 Max Stamina | 900 | Water, Corn (1) |
The Kitchen Bench is also where Bread Dough and Pastry are crafted.
Food | Effects | Duration | Required Elements |
---|---|---|---|
Beer | +40 Water +125 Max Stamina | 900 | Beer Bottle (1), Wheat (20), Yeast (1) |
Berry Jam | +40 Food +125 Max Stamina | 900 | Glass Jar (1), Berries (5) |
Pickled Carrot | +150 Food +150 Max Stamina | 1200 | Glass Jar (1), Carrot (4) |
Wine | +40 Water +125 Max Stamina | 900 | Wine Bottle (1), Berries (10), Reed Flower (1) |
The Biofuel Stove can only be placed attached to a Kitchen Bench.
Food | Effects | Duration | Required Elements |
---|---|---|---|
Bread | +80 Food +100 Max Health | 1200 | Bread Dough (1) |
Crumbed Fish Fillet | +150 Food +150 Maximum Health | 1200 | Raw Fish (1), Animal Fat (1), Bread Dough (1) |
Fruit Pie | +150 Food +75 Max Health | 1200 | Pastry (1), Berries (1), Watermelon (1) |
Meat Pie | +150 Food +225 Max Health | 1200 | Pastry (1), Mushroom (5), Pumpkin (1), Raw Meat (1) |
Pumpkin Bread | +150 Food +150 Max Stamina | 1200 | Pumpkin (1), Bread Dough (1) |
Vegetable Pie | +150 Food +150 Max Health | 1200 | Pastry (1), Squash (1), Soy Bean (1), Corn (1) |
Orbital meals are researched and crafted via the Workshop before missions.
Meal | Effects | Duration | Research Cost | Crafting Cost |
---|---|---|---|---|
Micromeal | +100 Food +10% Stamina Regeneration | 1200 | 25 | 10 |
Ultrameal | +200 Food +10% Stamina Regeneration | 3600 | 50 | 25 |
Endurogel | +50 Stamina | Instant | 25 | 25 |
Oxygel | +150 Oxygen | Instant | 25 | 10 |
Go | +100 Water +10% Health Regeneration | 1200 | 25 | 10 |
We hope this guide on food in ICARUS was helpful. If you have any questions, comments, or have some info we’re lacking, please let us know in the comment section below!