When playing Minecraft, your hunger bar slowly goes down and needs to be replenished with food. Certain activities like sprinting around your survival Minecraft home will deplete your hunger even more quickly. If you don’t eat anything, you will start taking health damage over time.
There are so many different types of food in the game and some are easier than others to find. Some types of food include animal meats, farmed crops, and fish. Typically, cooked meat products from animals are some of the best and most accessible foods for restoring hunger. This guide will go over the best foods in Minecraft and how to cook them.
Hunger Mechanics
Before we get into the best foods, first it is important to understand how hunger works in Minecraft. Every food restores two important values: hunger and saturation (satiety/fullness).
Hunger is the food icon visible above the player’s main inventory bar and appears as a row of small meat icons. Every player can have a maximum of 20 hunger points (with each full meat icon being worth 2 hunger points). So for example, if you ate an apple which restores 4 hunger points, you would instantly add 2 meat icons to your hunger bar.
Saturation is more complicated and is an invisible value that determines how long a food keeps you full before the hunger bar starts going down again. Have you ever noticed that eating a cookie does not keep you full very long, but eating a steak does? This is because steak has a much higher saturation level than a cookie.
Minecraft Food Tier List
When comparing all the different foods in Minecraft, some are definitely better than others. However, better foods are usually harder or more complicated to obtain. It can be difficult to get the best food into your Minecraft kitchen early on.
To rank each food, it is important to consider these factors: hunger restoration, saturation restoration, and overall utility. Some other lists look only at the numbers and rank vegetables quite highly, however I don’t think eating 5 beetroots is “better” or the same as eating one bread!
S Tier (Best)
| Food | Hunger Restoration | Saturation Restoration |
|---|---|---|
| Golden Carrot | 6 | 14.4 |
| Golden Apple | 4 | 9.6 |
A Tier (Good) Minecraft Food
| Food | Hunger Restoration | Saturation Restoration |
|---|---|---|
| Steak | 8 | 12.8 |
| Cooked Porkchop | 8 | 12.8 |
| Cooked Mutton | 6 | 9.6 |
| Cooked Salmon | 6 | 9.6 |
| Rabbit Stew | 10 | 12 |
B Tier (Average) Minecraft Food
| Food | Hunger Restoration | Saturation Restoration |
|---|---|---|
| Bread | 5 | 6 |
| Beetroot Soup | 6 | 7.2 |
| Baked Potato | 5 | 6 |
| Mushroom Stew | 6 | 7.2 |
| Cooked Chicken | 6 | 7.2 |
| Cooked Cod | 5 | 6 |
| Cooked Rabbit | 5 | 6 |
| Suspicious Stew | 6 | 7.2 |
| Pumpkin Pie | 8 | 4.8 |
C Tier (Poor) Minecraft Food
| Food | Hunger Restoration | Saturation Restoration |
|---|---|---|
| Apple | 4 | 2.4 |
| Chorus Fruit | 4 | 2.4 |
| Raw Beef | 3 | 1.8 |
| Raw Porkchop | 3 | 1.8 |
| Raw Rabbit | 3 | 1.8 |
| Carrot | 3 | 3.6 |
D Tier (Terrible) Minecraft Food
| Food | Hunger Restoration | Saturation Restoration |
|---|---|---|
| Cake Slice | 2 | 0.4 |
| Cookie | 2 | 0.4 |
| Raw Mutton | 2 | 1.2 |
| Raw Chicken | 2 | 1.2 |
| Raw Cod | 2 | 0.4 |
| Raw Salmon | 2 | 0.4 |
| Glow Berries | 2 | 0.4 |
| Tropical Fish | 1 | 0.2 |
| Pufferfish | 1 | 0.2 |
| Rotten Flesh | 1 | 0.2 – 0.6 |
| Sweet Berries | 2 | 0.4 – 1.2 |
| Beetroot | 1 | 1.2 |
| Potato | 1 | 0.6 |
| Melon Slice | 2 | 1.2 |
Best Minecraft Food for Beginners
When first starting out, you may be wondering what is the best beginner food in Minecraft? Typically, the easiest foods to get early on are apples (from tree leaves) and bread (grown from wheat). Both are very easily accessible as you’ll find apples from simply cutting trees and wheat seeds can be found just by clearing grass.
Note that wheat seeds will need to be planted on tilled soil (right clicking dirt with a hoe), near water, and with sufficient light to grow. Some Minecraft biomes don’t have many trees (like deserts or plains), so for your first survival base it can be a good idea to build near a forest or similar biome.
Later on, farming animals like cows for beef/steak is an excellent food source all-around. Cows can be easily bred for meat by right clicking two nearby cows while holding wheat in your hand. For more information on breeding animals, check out this article.
How to Cook Meat in Minecraft
All “raw” meats can be cooked in a furnace, similar to how ores are smelted into ingots. The cooked version of the meat is significantly better for relieving hunger and providing fullness (saturation). Potatoes can also be cooked this way to craft baked potatoes.
How to Make Bread in Minecraft
Bread can be made by combining 3 wheat horizontally in a crafting table. Bread does not need to be “baked” in a furnace or combined with other ingredients like eggs or milk.
More Minecraft Cooking Recipes
Pumpkin Pie Recipe
Pumpkin Pie is crafted by combining 1 sugar, 1 pumpkin, and 1 egg in a crafting table.
Cookie Recipe
Cookies are crafted by combining 2 wheat and 1 cocoa beans in a crafting table.
Cake Recipe
Cakes are crafted by combining 3 wheat, 3 milk, 1 egg, and 2 sugar in a crafting table.
Beetroot Soup Recipe
Beetroot soup is crafted by combining 6 beetroot and 1 bowl in a crafting table.
Mushroom Stew Recipe
Mushroom Stew is crafted by combining 1 red mushroom, 1 brown mushroom, and 1 bowl in a crafting table.
Rabbit Stew Recipe
Rabbit Stew is crafted by combining 1 cooked rabbit, 1 carrot, 1 baked potato, 1 red mushroom, and 1 bowl in a crafting table.
How to Get Golden Apples and Golden Carrots in Minecraft
Golden Carrots and Golden Apples can be either crafted or found as treasure in the world.
Golden Apple Recipe
A golden apples is crafted by combining 8 gold ingots and 1 apple in a crafting table.
Golden Carrot Recipe
Golden carrots are crafted by combining 8 gold nuggets and 1 carrot in a crafting table.
RYAN
Monday 22nd of November 2021
You Forgot Baked Potatoes.
Heather
Sunday 2nd of July 2023
@RYAN, it’s on the B-list, unless you’re talking about the recipe portion which baked potatoes are just cooked in a furnace.