Meat

Meat is the edible flesh of animals in and is one of the six main types of food WoW. However, the edible flesh of fully aquatic animals is a separate food type, fish.

Types of meat

There is also a distinction between meat that is ready to eat, which is a consumable, and meat ingredients, using in cooking food, which are trade goods. Player characters can only eat consumable meat, but hunter pets can often eat meat ingredients. Consumable meat will have a description of the meat benefits, clearly indicating consumable meat status. Meat ingredients are merely trade items with little description.

Some inventory items are 'meat' and use meat graphics for their icon, but are not meat food in the game. These will usually be quest items. Many of the beginning quests are a 'hunt for food' quest that use this type of object. (Similarly, many of the beginning quests are a 'hunt for hides' quest that use hides that are not leather trade goods items.) Two maces, obtainable though Darkmoon Faire ticket redemption, use meat graphics and a leg of meat 3D model.

Raw food types

Two new food types, raw meat and raw fish, were added with the release of The Burning Crusade. There is not a whole lot of documentation or examples of raw meat and raw fish. It is clear that consumable food items with the name 'raw ...' such as the raw fishes, are not of the type 'raw ...'; raw fish are (generally) edible consumables, and player characters cannot eat the new raw food types. The one example is [Partially Digested Meat] which appears to be a poor quality vendor trash item. The addition of the two 'raw ...' types does not appear to be a significant factor in game play; the four pet types (Dragonhawks, Nether Rays, Ravagers, and Serpents) that can eat one or both of these can also eat the more readily available normal version. Interestingly, the mob, Crocolisks, that drop the one known example, Partially Digested Meat, will not eat it when tamed as a pet.

'Ingredients' is not the same thing as the raw types, but there may be some overlap. Meat eaters will all eat pretty much any meat ingredient that looks like meat, but will not eat [Spider Ichor], for example.

Uses

Player Characters can eat meat to recover health. Many cooked meat items also provide a [Well Fed] buff.
Hunters can feed meat to some pets; some of the more popular pets eat only meat.
Many meat items are used as ingredients for foods that can be created by cooking.

(These are the same uses as other types of food.)

Sources

Players can frequently loot meat (flesh) from dead beast mobs. Because of this, hunter pets that only eat meat, which is the most restrictive hunter pet diet, are actually easy to feed. The beast flesh meat is generally ingredient meat and is not directly edible by player characters.
Players can loot edible meat (carried food) from dead humanoid mobs and from chests.
Edible meat can be gotten as quest rewards.
Players can purchase edible meat from meat vendors.
Many meat type foods can be created by cooking.
Since meat drops so frequently from beasts, and meat can be traded, the auction house is always a good source.

Types of buyable meat

Name	Level Requirement	HP Healed	Price¹
[Tough Jerky]		61 health over 18 seconds	25
[Haunch of Meat]	5	243 health over 21 seconds	1 25
[Mutton Chop]	15	552 health over 24 seconds	5
[Wild Hog Shank]	25	874 health over 27 seconds	10
[Cured Ham Steak]	35	1392 health over 30 seconds	20
[Roasted Quail]	45	2148 health over 30 seconds	40
[Smoked Talbuk Venison]	55	4320 health over 30 seconds	56
[Clefthoof Ribs]	65	7500 health over 30 seconds	80
[Salted Venison]	65	13200 health over 30 seconds	85
[Mead Basted Caribou]	75	15000 health over 30 seconds	1 60