Jumping into Hungry Horrors banquet mode can feel brutal when you run out of dishes before satisfying a greedy royal. One wrong modifier or a sloppy starter deck will ruin your kitchen run before you even clear the first area.
You’ll learn how to pick the right setup, assemble tight craving chains, and conquer every biome to unlock new princesses without breaking a sweat.
Choose Your Banquet
I’m assuming you’ve tackled a bit of the main story already and know the basics. Go ahead and select Banquet Mode to get started.
Next up, pick your modifiers. You can browse through the lists above or just click around to see what catches your eye.
Winning banquet runs unlocks new princesses—take down a run with the Basic Princess, for example, and you’ll open up the next one. Just keep in mind that you can’t crank up the difficulty until you clear the baseline setting for that specific princess and mode.
To show you how it works, I’m rolling with the Clumsy Princess (she forces you to discard a card every single turn) in Culinary mode (every dish disappears once eaten or fed) on Raw difficulty, which is the default.
Setup
Now it’s time to put together a starter deck. Unless you’re playing the Random Princess—who just hands you random starter recipes—I strongly suggest building around three or four dish types that chain directly into each other.
This is practically mandatory in Culinary mode. That craving chain is literally the only thing keeping you alive before your deck runs completely dry, so synergy is everything. In my setup, I also throw in a single off-chain healing dish; it sits safely in your hand so Culinary mode won’t burn it up.
Every single Banquet run is locked to 3 specific biomes in a set order: starter, main course, and dessert. Naturally, things get tougher with each stage.
Clear out the first biome to open the door to the second, and beat that one to punch your ticket to the finale.
You’ll see every horror’s taste profile upfront—loves, likes, dislikes, and hates are laid bare, so no guesswork needed. That said, don’t let your guard down; it’s still plenty challenging!
Strategy
In Culinary mode, enemies drop more and more ingredients as you progress, and you get to cook after every single fight. Never skip this! Your deck burns down permanently whenever you feed a horror or eat something yourself, so keeping your stock refilled with high-tier food is vital.
Better ingredients drop deeper into your run. Always lean into path rewards that offer ingredients or recipes over anything else.
Grabbing ready-made dishes might seem tempting, but trust me, they vanish after one use. Seasonings fall into the exact same trap.
Deckbuilder mode is a whole different animal: you want finished dishes, not recipes. Snagging raw dishes is your primary path to beefing up your deck.
Feed Faelinis every chance you get. He loves the food, and trimming your weaker cards means you’ll draw your heavy hitters far more consistently. Skip ingredient and recipe rewards here—you won’t have enough chances to cook, and the odds of actually matching components are painfully low.
No matter which mode you pick, potions are always a reliable reward pick. Gold has its moments if you’re planning a shop trip, but I wouldn’t go out of my way for it.
I’d hunt down at least one elite encounter in the very first biome to snag your second cookware. You automatically get another one at the end of the biome anyway, which instantly maxes you out at three cookware.
It’s definitely sweaty in Culinary mode since you can run out of food fast, so only jump in when you feel confident in your current stock of dishes and ingredients.
You’ll pick up Scrolls of Taliesin along the way. Pop them between biomes to grab some sweet perks—don’t let them sit there gathering dust!
Always look for ways to upgrade your setup as you advance. In Deckbuilder mode, that means grabbing stronger food and trimming the trash.
In Culinary mode, it’s all about whipping up better recipes after each fight while securing a steady stream of groceries to keep the kitchen running.
It’s the true roguelike feast you’ve been hungry for—pun fully intended. Have fun out there!
Remember to pack at least one dedicated healing dish that sits safely in your hand, especially when Culinary rules threaten to scrap your entire menu. Good luck out there, keep those craving chains linked, and show those fussy royals who really runs the kitchen!