Free-to-play Cooking training

Level advancement
This is one way to advance the Cooking skill level.

An alternate method to level
This is an alternate method to level cooking without burning fish; however, it will most likely be slower than the method above. It is recommended to use the above method to attain level 50 cooking before beginning.

Another Way To Train Cooking
A great way to train cooking without losing money is this: shrimps to 33, anchovies to 48, then trout to 99. This works because players lose money on the 1000 shrimps needed, but then make that money back with anchovies, then make a one coin profit with trout. For example, cooked trout sells for, and raw trout sells for (in gp for both). This allows one to get to 99 cooking without sacrificing their treasury. Keep in mind that this method is slower than the previous methods.

Sell and buy, or just trade
Fish play a big role in the cooking market, particularly the high level ones. They make up the bulk of the food market, and with high demands in both raw and cooked forms.

When training on lobsters or sharks, players may wish to use the RuneScape food forum to buy raw fish and sell cooked ones.

Note that buying most fish raw from the Grand Exchange and selling the cooked product in the Grand Exchange is no longer profitable due to many players buying mass amounts of fish to get to 99 Cooking. For many fish there is a significant price difference between cooked and raw fish. If players wish to be profitable, they should sell on-demand - e.g. near Bounty Hunter - when many players are buying small amounts of food at above Grand Exchange prices. This, however, is a slow way to sell food. 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 takes much longer to prepare the ingredients for combining.

Cost Control
Anchovies are one of the few fish that players can buy raw, sell cooked, and gain profit. This is due to the fact that people buy cooked anchovies to make anchovy pizza, the highest Free-to-Play food. This is also good because it can be cooked at level 5.

Another good way for training cooking for no loss is to buy raw trout. Usually they sell for around 30gp each, and cooked trout sell for around 30gp each too. This is a good way to gain cooking exp without spending lots of money. However, cooked trout takes a very long time to sell because there is not a high demand for them.

However, in exchange for the low cost, these methods provide very slow experience rates. At higher levels, players may wish to move on to higher-level foods that give better experience.

All in all, cooking is not a very good money-making skill, and it should be warned that it is not a very useful skill to train unless you are trying to boost your overall skill level for the high scores or get a skill cape.

Cook in the right environment
Some places are more suited for cooking than others. Here are some recommended places.