Cookie

The cookie is an edible item that requires Cocoa Beans to craft, which appear in dungeon chests, or on Jungle trees off of Cocoa Plants.

A full stack of 64 cookies restores a total of 64 Hunger points (the same amount of hunger points as 16 Cooked Porkchops).

Advantages

 * Cookies are made in stacks of 8 from just a single cocoa bean and two wheat.
 * Since cookies can be stacked into large stacks (of 64 in the latest snapshot), they can be used to quickly restore many hunger points.
 * Cookies recover 1 hunger point. Before that build they only restored half a hunger point, the lowest in the game at the time.
 * Cookies can be eaten as soon as the player falls below 9 hunger points without any waste, meaning the player can constantly stay at a high enough hunger level to restore health.
 * Cocoa beans are easy to acquire hanging on jungle trees, making them much cheaper and worth the effort to get.

Disadvantages

 * A single cocoa produces enough cookies to restore the hunger meter as much as two cooked porkchops or steaks. However, porkchops/steaks are much easier to acquire, and a single one is easier to eat than eight cookies.
 * A full stack of cookies heals a total of 64 hunger points, where as a full stack of cooked porkchops/steaks heals 256 hunger points. For comparison, you'd need 256 cookies (4 full stacks of 64) to heal 256 hunger points.
 * Cookies have a quite low saturation level compared to cooked porkchops/steaks.
 * Melons have a similar food restoration and saturation level, but unlike cookies, can be farmed automatically using a BUD switch. Melons can also be directly crafted into seeds, where as cookies require wheat, cocoa beans, and jungle wood.

History
Since their introduction, cocoa beans were arguably the scarcest item in the game, making cookies a rare trophy. However, in version 1.3, the beans became farmable, making cookies a cheap small-change food. Especially with their increased food value, they seem likely to replace melon slices in that role.