Once you defeat Crimson Mare Mk. II, you will return to the village of Gongaga, where some new quests will open up for you. One of these is Teach Me, Great Warrior, and completing that will unlock The Spice of Life. This quest will have Cissnei trying her hand at cooking, which doesn’t seem to be going too well. She asks for help procuring the ingredients, so you offer your services.

The Spice of Life Location¶

As mentioned above, you will first need to be near the end of Chapter 9 of the main story, which is after the events at the Gongaga Reactor. One of the quests that unlock is called Teach Me, Great Warrior, which isn’t terribly long and just involves fighting a bunch of fiends. After completing that, you will unlock The Spice of Life back in Gongaga, inside Cissnei’s house. Approach her in the kitchen to start the quest.

Cissnei is making some Gongaga Mushroom Soup, but it didn’t come out quite as well as she planned. She mentions that it needs something to set it over the top, and sends you off to gather some ingredients for her. To start, she mentions Torgan’s vegetables, with the produce peddler being near the village’s entrance.

Follow the Produce Peddler¶

The produce peddler helping out Torgan is a dog named Melon, so Aerith suggests following it back to Torgan. This chase is uneventful, though, as there won’t be any enemies along the way. After some conversation, you will finally get some vegetables from him, plus he will offer some suggestions on what to add to the soup. Instead of normal Gongaga Mushrooms, he mentions Magonga Mushrooms for their better flavor, as well as some salt.

Gongaga Rock Salt Locations¶

First, you will be going after the salt deposits and thankfully, you’ll have Melon guiding you to them. Speak to Melon and tell him you’re ready to go, causing him to run off, so it’s time to follow. Of course, unlike the previous chase, you will run into fiends along the way this time. The first two should be nothing special, but the third set of enemies will contain a Gorgon Mane. This jellyfish-like foe will be hard to hit, but if you use fire-based attacks, then that will make things easier.

After clearing the enemies, Melon will take you to the deposit nearby, where you need to pick the correct Rock Salt. Thankfully, Torgan gave you a picture of which one to grab, and it’s pretty obvious which one you should pick (the brighter pink one). For the other two, look for a nearby series of hills you can climb, which will take you all the way to the top, with a wooden bridge. Don’t cross the bridge, but instead look nearby for the salt deposits. As with the one on ground level, choose the brighter pink salt deposits.

Magonga Mushroom Locations¶

For the mushrooms, you will need to use your Chocobo and travel to Magon Hill. This is located to the south of Gongaga, so fast travel back there and leave via the southern gate. Take the path immediately out of the gate, past the second gate, and follow the trail to the south. You should pass underneath the arch where you found Sotetsu for the Teach Me, Great Warrior quest. Cross the bridge just beyond and you will arrive at Magon Hill. When you reach the Chocobo mushroom there, you should get some dialog and you can officially start looking for the Magonga Mushrooms.

Similarly to the items you can find with your Chocobo while riding them, you should see an orange icon over their head. Do the usual treasure hunt stuff here (hold up on the D-Pad) to get a trail, which has you using the nearby mushroom. It should place you on the ground level and right near the spot with the first Magonga Mushroom. Approach it to start the mushroom plucking minigame.

Plucking Magonga Mushrooms¶

The mushroom plucking minigame is simple in nature, as the in-game tutorial shows. You start by moving the left analog stick to test the pliability of each section of the mushroom. The section with the most pliability should be what you tug first, while the portion with the least should be tugged last. The main goal is to simply find the correct order on the mushrooms, which is not a set order and changes every single time you play this quest.

After choosing the order for tugging each section of the mushroom, hold down L2 and R2 to pluck the mushroom. There seems to be a little leeway in the game giving you one or two extra tries to get a perfect mushroom pull. The first mushroom will have three sections to tug, with each subsequent shroom gaining an additional section. To make matters a little more annoying, there will be Gorgon Manes at the second and third locations. Of course, you should know how to deal with them, but if not, look above for the strategy.

Once you have plucked all three mushrooms and gotten the three Rock Salts, return to Cissnei in Gongaga to hand over the ingredients. She and Aerith will cook up the mushroom soup and the quest will be brought to an end.

The Spice of Life Rewards¶

You will receive the usual assortment of rewards from completing The Spice of Life, like Party EXP and character experience. Since you had Aerith helping you out during the quest, you will improve your relationship with her. As for the item, you will obtain a pair of Chakra Materia Earrings.