Trial Stew

A Trial Stew is an item in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door and Super Paper Mario, made by cooking Couple's Cake with a Poison Shroom. If used, it lowers Mario and his partner to one HP and down to zero FP, but completely fills SP.

Lowering the player to one HP could offer an opportunity for a Mega Rush (P) Strategy, but this strategy hits a roadblock because the FP is lowered to 0. Some players ignore this and just don't use attacks that consume Flower Points. Others use Sweet Treat or Sweat Feast to bring their FP up (however, they have to be careful not to up their HP unless they want to use Power Rush instead, in which they can up their HP to 5). There are many strategies for using Trial Stew, but the casual player will probably have no use for this, other than refilling star power; which is useful if the player has a low star power. However, it can be bad because the player has only 1 HP and 0 FP.

It also appears in Super Paper Mario. With no SP in this game, it is a mostly horrible item with mostly negative effects, however, it gives the player 100 points for every HP it drains. Therefore, it is best used only if the player has healing items or is near an inn. Best of all, the player can go to the life-restoring fountain in Chapter 7. In this case, Trial Stew is actually superior to Couple's Cake, because it will provide more points.

Trivia

 * Its name is probably derived from the Pit of 100 Trials, due to the desperate nature of using it.