Tips and Tricks: KEYS

Keys in Gourmet Ranch will unlock any crops, animals or seasonal items you wish to grow.  

For example here is two rows of the 2011 Halloween Ingredients. If you notice, the first set of items needing to be unlocked take two keys each. The next item should be 3 keys each and so on.  

You get TWO keys every time you go up a level.  As you can see at my next level, just two keys. Doesn't matter how high you go that is all you will get on every single level. 

You can also find keys thru fishing.   

As a low level, keys will come fast and furious to you. Its best to not be in a hurry to spend them all right away.  The reason for this is two fold. First, as you get higher in levels, the more experience you need, therefore the more time between when you receive keys.  

The second is that regular ingredients go on sale once a month or so.  This is thru something called the SLOT MACHINE.   If you see this down by your neighbor bar, its a good week!  There is usually a timer of about 3-4 days. 

It will save you up to 50% , so instead of spending 36 keys to unlock a single column, it might only cost you 17 keys.  Given that to unlock every single regular in Gourmet Ranch it is a few thousand keys, you really, really want to be frugal about where and when you spend them.

A quick tip on using the slot machine. You are NOT stuck with the first column you are given. If you want a second spin, buy the first item in the column you were offered. So if you are offered a column in vegetables and the first ingredient to unlock is cabbage, unlock it and ONLY it.  You will then get another spin on the slot machine for a different column.  You only get the discount ONCE each time it pops up. So if it pops up 12 times in a year. Then you can get the discount 12 times. One for each time it appears.  

Keys can also be used to unlock avatars though I personally would NOT suggest that. However if you have been playing awhile or you want a more custom ranch  it is certainly a way you can add that personal flair.

Be mindful keys might be plentiful as you get started but once you get into those higher levels, It takes longer and longer to accumulate them without using real money.  And while you can use GR cash to purchase them, I would also be hesitant as it can get very expensive, really quickly. 

Individual keys are priced at 5 GR cash each. Yikes that is pricey, considering on average you only get about 10 GR cash per quest. Which by the way is better spent elsewhere.  Like on an expansion or a speedy stove. 

Tips and Tricks: What to Serve on Your Counters

So you have all these counters but you don't know what to put on them? Well that is easy!!! Super Dishes! Any dish over 200 coins per serving is acceptable.  Save one or two counters for your Mini-Quests.  The reason I say this is because you will serve the same number of people regardless of what is on your counters. As long as each counter has food on it, you will sell the maximum number of dishes.  The thing is, it is better to serve 5000 customers a 200 coin dish than to serve those 5000 customers a 10 coin dish.

If you look at the top left corner area you should see this icon and a corresponding number. The higher the heart count, the more customers you serve. More customers served, means you are making more money.   The heart is affected by counters, and certain functional decor.  Most of the Master trophies will add +100 hearts. Each full counter also adds hearts to your meter.

Obviously when you are working on the Mini-Quests you have to serve those dishes to your counters straight from the stove top.  But you do not have to leave them there.  If you need space and someday you will, you can feel free to delete them.  You can also speed them up if you prefer however speedups are best left for when you have a MASSIVE amount of a super dish on your counters and you need the coins.  I will cover that a bit more in depth later on. But for now, just keep your counters filled with high dishes and delete the low paying ones as you need space!

I will be adding a Super Dish list later on and you can have an idea of what dishes to watch for in order to fill your counters. 

Tips and Tricks: Medals and Achievements

This is a quick way to get some fast experience points.  If you go to the lower right hand corner of your game screen you should see this icon. This is where you can see what achievements you have and which ones you still need.

You can get experience for harvesting crops or animals, buying and selling dishes and ingredients, as well as cooking and serving dishes. These dishes have to be cooked and served from YOUR stove only to count.  And you only need one of each.  A neat little trick is that DELIVERIES count towards medals. Therefore if you go thru all the deliveries eventually you will end up serving a vast majority of the dishes for the medals. And you will not have to use up precious counter space.

Here are a few screen shots of the achievement pages.  Note that the cooking has SIX pages of achievements and farming has four. All the other achievements have just a single page of achievements.

If you see a GOLD trophy that means you are done with that achievement.  If you see just medals that means you are still working on it. 

Spending is easy!

Trading is easy too!

If you look at the cooking and farming achievements you will notice some of the items are colored in while others, are still transparent.  The transparent ones, are the ones I have not done yet. 

Tips and Tricks: SUPER Ingredients

SUPERS are YOUR SUPER FRIENDS!!!

During a Quest in your market you should notice at one, two or three columns. If you look at the very bottom of those columns you will see some very expensive ingredients.  Those bottom level ingredients are called SUPERS.  They are called Supers because they are part of a SUPER dish. A Super Dish is any dish where each serving sells for 200+ coins.


Check out the below picture. It is price of a single super and its respective grow time.

Now look at the cost to sell the Mezcal Larvae

That is a HUGE profit margin. 

Now lets look at the profit on cooking the dish.

It costs 52,850 to grow all three ingredients for this dish. And then it takes 12 hours to cook and you get over 2.6 million in coins. (Assuming you serve it. )

If you decide to sell it to your neighbors, your profit margin is still fairly huge.  The trade off is you get less coins but TONS more experience.

They are incredibly HUGE generators of coins and experience both in the growing, cooking and selling.   When a big Quest comes along and the dishes are high value, 300+, its in your best interest to unlock and grow at least one column of seasonals NONSTOP.  You generally only have a two week stretch to grow them and I would take advantage of every single opportunity.

And of course having the ability to sell the high value super dishes will net you huge profits and allow you to leap thru many of the lower levels in a matter of weeks. 

Getting Started on Gourmet Ranch

Gourmet Ranch is a farming and cooking game. Essentially you grow crops which you then cook on your stoves and serve to your customers.  This is a glimpse of my ranch.

If you look on your left hand side you will see a timer counting down. That is a Quest.
This is our current Quest

If you look to your right you will see a bunch of smaller icons those are Mini-Quests. These are not timed and can be completed at your leisure.

From there go up to the very top and center of your ranch. It should show you your level. It shows how much XP or experience you have earned and how much you have left to your next level. 

Now if you peek over in the top left hand corner you should see a bunch of icons stacked on top of each other. 

This is what coins you have earned and what is available. 

GR Cash, This can be used to buy keys or decorations or the faster red stoves. (My favorite)

Keys are the next item. These are used to unlock any item you want to grow. Its always good to have some keys on hand just in case. 

And under there is speedups. Speedups allow you to speed up stoves, counters, crops or animals. 

You will notice on the bottom is your  neighbor bar this is where you can find your neighbors. They are super important to your game. You need neighbors to help you build your boat house and to buy and sell items to.  Here is a row of my top neighbors. You can see a few have items and dishes for sale.  Ingredients for sale is the apple carrot icon. Dishes are the little slices of pie you see. 

Then in your bottom right corner you should see a bunch of small icons

 The Market where you unlock items to grow. 

 This is for in game achievements. You can get lots of XP here. 

 Neighbor management. Here you can visit neighbors, see who has visited you and of course add, remove or block neighbors in game. 

 This icon will allow you to customize your avatar

 This is for collections. During Fishing trips you sometimes find these items. If you collect all in a particular series, you get a prize. 

 This is the decor icon. From here you will buy stoves, counters, chairs, tables, wallpaper, flooring and all kinds of stuff to make your ranch unique. 

 The expansion icon is for expanding your ranch, your cafe and your fridge. 

The Gifts tab. This is where your friends and neighbors send you gifts. If its yellow like this that  means you have gifts waiting for you to collect. 

 The recipe book where you will find all regular dishes and a few seasonal dishes. Most seasonal dishes can only be found in the recipe book during their quest.

Now looking around your ranch you might find a few other items.  These are places you are gonna use frequently.  

Deliveries. From here you will be asked to cook dishes in exchange for GR Cash, Coins, XP, and Special Decor. These are timed. And each delivery requires you to ask neighbors for gas. 

This is your larder. Everything you grow / harvest will go here. Items you buy from neighbors will go here as well.  

Storage is where all your decorations will go. 

And these are your stoves. The first shows a dish that is not yet completed. It tells you how much longer is needed. 

Once a dish is done it will give you an option to serve trade or store.

When you click on a ready stove it will show you what you will get for trading it versus serving. 

When cooking keep in mind once something is on your counters it is there until you delete it, it runs out or you speed it up.  Items served to the trade store or fridge can be moved to any of the three locations

This is the fridge at max capacity it will be able to hold 20 dishes. This one holds 15. 

This is your trade store.

And these are counters 

Also located on your ranch is fishing dock.  From here you can hunt for GR Cash, Coins, Keys and Special Decor as well as items to finish off collections. 

That is the rundown of everything on your ranch.  This is just the basics.  I will be adding more information on tips and tricks to help you really progress. I have been playing just over a year and have passed many people who have been playing 2-3 years. 

Thank you for reading and I hope to see you on the ranch!

Gourmet Ranch Thanksgiving Quest Information

Hi there ranchers!  I have made TWO e-books for the upcoming Thanksgiving Quest.  This Quest should start on November 19th and run thru the first Wednesday in December.  There are two e-books because there are actually THREE known Thanksgiving quests. The first quest from 2011 is so low paying I feel it is least likely and thus have not done an e-book on those dishes.  The 2nd Quest from 2012, titled A Buffalo Thanksgiving was repeated in 2014.  The 3rd quest is A Garfield Thanksgiving. It is the most desirable of the three quests but I believe it may be the most unlikely on account of licensing. Gourmet Ranch may or may not be able to re-release it without a new license.

The Buffalo Thanksgiving link is below.  It will be available for FREE from October 28 thru October 30th. I will also make it free again the week before Thanksgiving.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01779T2VO?*Version*=1&*entries*=0


The Garfield Thanksgiving link is below. It will be available for FREE from October 28 thru October 30th.  I will also make it free again the week before Thanksgiving

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01776Q3QE?*Version*=1&*entries*=0


I do not expect anyone to purchase it. I have made it free so everyone can download it.  If you don't have a kindle don't worry. You can download the Kindle app for free on any tablet, pc or phone. Which means you can sit with your phone in your lap and be able to glance at the quest and your farm at the same time.  If you have a neighbor who just starts and needs the book, amazon allows for free lending of any books you download. So even if only one person downloads it, it can be shared to multiple people.

I will not get rich off you. In fact just so you have an idea. in order to make $1000 I would need 200k downloads off the free ebook.  And for all 200k people to actually open and read each and every page.  SO obviously not going to get rich off anyone buying a free e-book.

I want to thank everyone who does download it. And I hope it proves to be useful to.

Inside each ebook is a list of seasonal ingredients, their dishes, photos of every single dish. As well as a spreadsheet so you can see the quest at a glance.


Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Gourmet Ranch Spirit of Halloween

I have made an Ebook with all the details from the Spirit of Halloween Quest (2013).

The book will be FREE to download from Tuesday October 6th to Saturday October 10th.

The Amazon kindle app is free to download and the book is free to download starting tomorrow.  You can also SHARE the book with any one of your friends once you have downloaded it.


Get the Ebook here!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0166WJSQ2?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

Thank you for downloading !