Well Fed

Well Fed, Plenty Satisfied, and Exquisitely Stuffed are buffs granted to the player depending on the food item consumed. The buff slightly improves all stats (listed below). Additionally, in, life regeneration will only be fully effective while the player is under the effects of one of these buffs.

Only one of these buffs may be active at a time and therefore they do not stack. The buff that is most recently applied takes priority.

Well Fed
Well Fed grants the following boosts:
 * +2 defense
 * +2% critical hit chance for all attacks (except from Summon weapons)
 * +5% melee and mining speed
 * +5% damage (including summons)
 * +0.5 minion knockback
 * +20% movement speed

The buff icon has a chicken leg and 1 star.

Plenty Satisfied
Plenty Satisfied grants the following boosts:
 * +3 defense
 * +3% critical hit chance for all attacks (except from Summon weapons)
 * +7.5% melee speed
 * +7.5% damage (including summons)
 * +0.75 minion knockback
 * +30% movement speed
 * +10% mining speed

The buff icon has a set of crab and 2 stars.

Exquisitely Stuffed
Exquisitely Stuffed grants the following boosts:
 * +4 defense
 * +4% critical hit chance for all attacks (except for Summon weapons)
 * +10% melee speed
 * +10% damage (including summons)
 * +1 minion knockback
 * +40% movement speed
 * +15% mining speed

The buff icon has a huge set of chicken and 3 stars.

Causes
The complete list of food items that grant these buffs is listed here.

Tips

 * On pre-1.4 platforms, this buff is simpler, but still extremely useful as it is easy to obtain, extremely versatile, and has a long duration.
 * During Halloween, Pumpkins for Pumpkin Pie are plentiful, and even at other times the Dryad can supply Pumpkin Seeds to farm them. Other food items can be crafted or picked up from varied sources.
 * Alternatively, a modest amount of fishing for other purposes can provide enough fish to keep a player well fed despite the shorter duration.
 * Most players should carry a stack of "food" items, and try to keep the buff always active. The movement bonus alone would make that worthwhile, but in  food is even more important, as it is required to regenerate health normally.  In any mode, the small but broad boost to combat abilities comes in handy.
 * Use this buff before boss fights or venturing into dangerous areas to gain a cheap and easy advantage. The movement buff makes it worthwhile even for exploring and mining.
 * On 1.4, the more powerful versions generally have shorter duration but are still fairly accessible.
 * The most powerful "Exquisitely Stuffed" can be had from an assortment of enemy drops with duration ranging from 8 to 24 minutes, notably Burgers (grapes should be crafted into grape juice); 4-minute Seafood Dinners can be cooked up from surplus "potion" fish or the otherwise-useless Neon Tetra. It's also possible (but tedious and potentially expensive) to obtain Bacon by smashing Pigronatas.  Most dramatically, any Golden Critter can be cooked into a Golden Delight that grants the buff for a full 48 minutes (and also remains saleable for the full ).
 * The mid-level "Plenty Satisfied" version can be had even more easily, dropping from lower-level enemies, sold by the Traveling Merchant (Pad Thai or Pho), or easily crafted; the easiest crafts include Pumpkin Pie, Bowl of Soup (goldfish and mushroom), Grub Soup (jungle bait), and Sauteed Frog Legs (frogs), as well as the rarer Roasted Duck.
 * The basic "Well Fed" buff can be provided by almost any other food item, notably by cooking common critters (bunnies, squirrels, birds including Seagulls), or the classic Cooked Fish from non-potion fish.

Trivia

 * The Cooked Marshmallow is currently the only item to have the same duration on all platforms.
 * The stars depicted in the buff icons may be the Michelin Stars, a rating system given to high level restaurants.