I eat my mushrooms and apples raw! Like nature intended. You can take your cooking, shove it in a pot and boil it!
I know there is one recipe I learned yesterday from a book in someone's house to take the Hard Pumpkin, Wheat (of some kind), Goat Butter and Milk to make some kind of pumpkin soup.
When I started playing this game, I cracked out a notebook to start taking notes to help remember things and collect recipes. However, I soon found out that the map system is well done to record most of the notations I'd want to make and with stamps it helps me keep track of other things I haven't yet solved.
The only thing left unrecorded is cooking but I stopped seeing the necessity of marking down recipes although elixirs are another matter. But with cooking, it just seems that as long as I'm putting together edible foods, it'll turn out alright. The only difference is what effect I want out of it. Want some cold resistance? Mix in a spicy pepper or two. Want more stamina? Mix in some Stamella shrooms with meat or an apple or just make a Stamella Mushroom Kebob. More stealth? Mix in some stealth shrooms or snails. More hearts? Then just cook with heart only ingredients like meat and fruit. I suppose there are probably some super recipes that might be found that one may just want to keep as a shortlist. Right now, though, it just seems that if you study your ingredients then you should have an idea of what you'll get from cooking. I've even noticed getting the same meal from different ingredients because the end effects are the same.
Elixirs, though, remain a bit of mystery to me of what the balance needs to be there. I've made a couple bad dishes from them and right now am just sticking with 2 - 3 ingredient mixtures. Since they are potions, they seem to follow different rules from the cooking rules which are more closer to real life ingredients.
Also, I want to send a shout-out to whoever came up with the cooking jingle in this game. I've had to hear a bit but it hasn't gotten old yet and really captures the joy of cooking.