If so, the Hoppers need to stop spawning at a certain point. If not, THAT purposely-unarmed player will never finish their Hopper round up.
I think an in-game earned cooking-feat if there was cooking implemented (to say that making a meal item has a fail-rate just like fishing initially; probably no related attribute though?) until you do something cool would be appropriate for this mechanic imo. It'd be cool if every merchant has a small chance to want exactly 1 food item, cause it would be hilarious and wholesome that everybody's gotta eat and they just want a burger. If there is a Food blueprint, it should obvious-also-definitely be just 1 blueprint to not bloat the blueprint menu any further, similar to extract humor or process plant. I think food costs a bit too much to just let the player generate so much currency from cooking it though. It needs to have a secondary investment cost into the blueprint, like a burger needs a bun that costs fair share, and others all need their thusly 1 main and 1 secondary food piece imo.