Blazing suns and scorching sands can cut Link’s adventure short-unless you know how to keep cool. Here’s how to survive the heat in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom with the right gear, meals, and clever tactics.
You’ll need to have heat resistance in order to proceed around the Gerudo Desert areas during the day, as you’ll overheat and lose hearts over time without it. To do this, you should make a handful of elixirs and foods that give you a heat resistance buff.
Note that being heat resistant is not the same thing as being fireproof. You will need different elixirs and armor for that.
Below, we list some ways to become heat resistant, including elixirs and food that you can cook up in a cooking pot.
Heat resistance elixir recipes
Mixing elixirs that grant heat resistance is straightforward once you have the right ingredients. Combine creatures like the Warm Darner or the Summerwing Butterfly with monster parts such as Bokoblin Horns at a cooking pot to create these potions. Their strength and duration depend on the quality and number of ingredients used. Drinking one lets Link explore scorching areas without taking damage, making them useful for venturing through deserts or volcanic zones.
For elixirs, you’ll want to mix specific lizards and bugs in a cooking pot with monster parts. The specific monster parts don’t particularly matter – as long as it says in the description that it can be used for elixirs, you’re safe.
You can use monster parts with a cold darner (Gerudo Highlands or Mount Lanayru) or a winterwing butterfly (Gerudo Highlands or Mount Lanayru). You can also buy winterwing butterflies from Beedle at Tabantha Bridge Stable. Butterflies will run once you approach, so make sure to creep up on them relatively quietly in order to successfully catch them.
The more buggy critters you use, the longer the elixir will last. Based on our testing, the quality of the monster drop you use doesn’t have an effect on the potion. Using a Red Bokoblin horn had the same effects as using a Blue Bokoblin horn.
Heat resistance food recipes
Cooking with ingredients that grant heat resistance is one of the easiest ways to survive hot areas in Tears of the Kingdom. Combine items like Chillshrooms, Cool Safflina, and Hydro Melons to make dishes and elixirs that lower body temperature and protect Link from intense heat. Higher-level recipes require rarer ingredients or multiple cooling components, extending the duration and strength of the resistance effect. Eating these meals before entering desert zones or volcanic regions allows safer exploration and prevents damage from extreme temperatures.
Cooking with hydromelons (Gerudo Desert), chillshrooms (Gerudo Highlands and Hebra Mountains), chillfin trout (Hebra Mountains and Lanayru Great Spring), or cool safflina (Hebra Mountains or Tabantha Frontier) will add warming properties to your food.
The more of the specialized food you use in your recipe, the longer the heat resistance buff will be. For example, using five hydromelons to make chilly simmered fruit gave us 12 minutes and 30 seconds of heat resistance.
Using armor to become heat resistant
Certain armor sets in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom provide natural protection against extreme heat. The Desert Voe armor, found in the Gerudo region, is the most reliable choice and grants strong resistance when all pieces are worn together. Players can upgrade these items at Great Fairy Fountains for improved durability and protection. Wearing heat-resistant armor allows Link to explore volcanic and desert areas safely without relying on consumable items.
You can also use armor to become heat resistant. The Desert Voearmor set, which you can buy from Kara-Kara Bazaar and complete a quest for in Gerudo Village, will provide you more levels of heat resistance the more you have equipped. The headpiece of the Desert Voe armor set costs 450 in Kara-Kara Bazaar. You can also purchase the Sapphire Circlet from Gerudo Village for 1,400 rupees to protect you from one level of heat.
Best heat-resistant food recipes and ingredients list
Here are some of the best heat-resistant food options in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, plus a focused ingredient list you can actually farm and use efficiently.
Top heat-resistant recipes
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Chilly Cheesy Baked Fish – 1 Hateno Cheese + 4 Chillfin Trout. High-level heat resistance for over 10 minutes and strong heart recovery, excellent for long Gerudo runs.
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Chilly Seafood Rice Balls – 1 Hylian Rice + 1-4 Chillfin Trout. Simple to make; more trout increases the strength/duration of the heat-resistance effect.
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Chilly Tomato Seafood Soup – 1 Hylian Tomato + 1-4 Chillfin Trout. Great if you’re swimming in tomatoes; provides solid heat resistance with decent healing.
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Chilly Fruit Pie – 1 Goat Butter + 1 Tabantha Wheat + 1 Cane Sugar + 1-2 Hydromelons. A “dessert” option that grants good heat resistance plus hearts, ideal before tough desert fights.
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Chilly Mushroom Risotto – 1 Goat Butter + 1 Hylian Rice + 1 Rock Salt + 1-2 Chillshrooms. Good duration, uses common pantry-style ingredients plus chill mushrooms.
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Chilly Tomato Mushroom Stew – 1 Hylian Tomato + 1-4 Chillshrooms. Designed for high-level heat resistance when you stack multiple Chillshrooms.
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Chilly Mushroom Rice Balls – 1 Hylian Rice + 1-4 Chillshrooms. Very efficient; the more Chillshrooms, the higher the heat-resistance tier and/or duration.
Recommended ingredient list
Prioritize farming and buying these key ingredients for heat-resistant cooking:
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Chillfin Trout – Core fish for many of the best “Chilly” meals; stack up to 4 per dish to boost effect.
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Chillshroom – Flexible chill ingredient used in stews, rice balls, and risottos for strong heat resistance.
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Hydromelon – Fruit used in Chilly Fruit Pie and other chill desserts; adds heat resistance and some hearts.
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Hylian Rice – Base carb for many rice ball and risotto recipes that combine with chill ingredients.
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Hylian Tomato – Common vegetable that pairs with Chillfin Trout or Chillshroom for soups and stews.
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Goat Butter, Cane Sugar, Tabantha Wheat – Baking staples for pies and richer dishes that still grant heat resistance.
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Rock Salt – Seasoning used in several cooked dishes like Chilly Mushroom Risotto.
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Hateno Cheese – Special ingredient for Chilly Cheesy Baked Fish, giving a long-lasting, high-level chill effect.
Simple “spam” recipes for farming
If you just want quick, repeatable heat-resistant food without fancy ingredients:
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Basic Chilly Mushroom Skewer – 1-5 Chillshrooms in a pot. More mushrooms = stronger or longer heat resistance.
Which ingredients give max heat resistance duration in Tears of the Kingdom
In Tears of the Kingdom, the duration of heat resistance mainly comes from how many “chilly” ingredients you use in one dish, not from any single special item, but some ingredients are better because they are high-tier heat-resistance types.
Best ingredient types for max duration
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Hydromelon – A core “chilly” fruit; cooking five Hydromelons together as Chilly Simmered Fruit can reach around 12+ minutes of low-level heat resistance, making it excellent for long duration.
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Chillshroom – A mid-tier heat-resistance ingredient; stacking several Chillshrooms in one dish boosts both level and duration, and high-tier recipes using up to four can exceed 10 minutes of high-level heat resistance.
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Chillfin Trout – A high-tier chilly ingredient; using multiple Chillfin Trout in recipes like Chilly Cheesy Baked Fish or Chilly Seafood Rice Balls grants high-level heat resistance with long durations (around or above 10 minutes).
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Cool Safflina – A basic heat-resistance plant; five of these together give good duration at low level, useful if you have many but lack higher-tier fish or mushrooms.
How to maximize duration
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Use as many chilly ingredients of the same type as possible (up to five slots) in one dish; quantity directly adds duration on top of the base effect.
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Stick to one effect per dish (only chilly ingredients plus neutral fillers like meat or rice) so you don’t dilute the heat-resistance buff with another status effect.
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For optimal balance, use 4-5 of a single strong ingredient (Hydromelon, Chillshroom, or Chillfin Trout) in one recipe to get both a high level and long duration without wasting rare items.
