Automate a Restaurant Beginner Guide – Quest, Trello, NPC

If you’ve just started Automate a Restaurant on Roblox, the first few minutes can feel a little confusing. You’re growing crops, carrying ingredients around, cooking food, serving customers, and suddenly the game is asking you for hundreds of dollars to unlock more space.

The good news is that the early game is actually pretty straightforward once you understand what everything is doing.

I spent some time working through the progression, and the biggest thing I noticed is that your farm is basically the engine behind your restaurant. The better your crops and upgrades become, the better food you can make, and that means more money coming back to you.

So, if you’re trying to go from a tiny restaurant with a couple of carrots to a much more profitable setup, here’s how I’d approach the early game.

When you first enter the game, don’t worry about buying everything you see. Your first job is simply to get the basic production loop running.

You’ll be moving ingredients into your cooking station, preparing the food, picking up the finished dishes, and then serving them to customers.

The basic loop looks like this:

Grow ingredients → Harvest crops → Put ingredients in the pot → Cook food → Serve customers → Collect money → Upgrade your farm

That’s essentially the foundation of the entire game.

Once you understand this loop, everything else starts making much more sense.

The easiest way to make money early on is to keep your farm producing crops constantly.

For example, carrots can be planted and harvested, then used to make stew for your customers. After serving the stew, you collect the cash and use that money to improve your setup.

Don’t just stand around waiting for customers. If your crops are growing, you’re already working toward your next payout.

One of the early examples in the gameplay produced a dish worth $67, while later dishes were selling for more than $190 and $230.

That’s why upgrading your ingredients and farm becomes so important.

Whenever you have an empty farming spot, plant something.

It’s easy to get distracted by the restaurant side of the game and forget about the farm, but your crops are what allow you to keep cooking.

A good habit is:

• Harvest your ready crops.

• Replant immediately.

• Take the harvested ingredients to the cooking station.

• Prepare the best food you currently can.

• Serve it.

• Collect the money.

• Return to the farm.

Doing this repeatedly gives you a steady flow of cash instead of relying on one big payout.

If you’re wondering where your money should go, the farm is one of the most important upgrades you can make.

Better farming production means more ingredients, which means more food, which ultimately means more money.

In the early game, I’d prioritize expanding and improving your farm instead of spending all your money on random things.

The progression shown in the gameplay makes this pretty clear. The player starts with basic carrots, then begins unlocking better crops such as beets, onions, and lettuce.

As the ingredients improve, the value of the food you’re producing also goes up.

So don’t think of the farm as a side activity. It’s really part of your restaurant’s money-making system.

Once you’ve got some money coming in, you can start using the seed rolls/spins to get different crops.

At first, you may keep getting carrots or beets, which can feel a little frustrating.

That’s exactly what happened during the gameplay. Several rolls weren’t particularly useful, so a luck upgrade was purchased to improve the chances of getting different seeds.

Eventually, the player managed to get onions, followed later by lettuce.

If you’re repeatedly getting the same basic crops, improving your luck can be worth considering rather than endlessly spending money on rolls and hoping for something better.

This is probably the most important progression tip in the whole game.

A better crop isn’t just another item to put in your garden. It can help you create more valuable dishes.

For example, early carrot stew was producing relatively small payouts. Later, stronger combinations were giving payouts around $190, $214, and even $230 in the gameplay.

So when you’re deciding what to unlock next, ask yourself:

“Will this help me produce better food?”

If the answer is yes, it’s probably worth working toward.

The game uses money milestones to unlock additional farming space.

One of the first major goals shown in the gameplay is saving $400 to unlock the next plot.

After that, another section requires around $700.

These expansions are important because additional space means more room for crops, and more crops means more ingredients available for cooking.

So when you reach one of these milestones, don’t spend all your money immediately on something unnecessary.

Save toward the next plot.

It might feel slow for a few minutes, but once you have additional farming space producing ingredients, your income can start picking up much faster.

There’s also a dedicated tool shop where you can improve your harvesting equipment.

Don’t overlook this shop.

The gameplay shows that tool upgrades can help with harvesting your plants and generally make your farming routine more efficient.

When you’re spending a lot of time running around your garden collecting crops, even small efficiency improvements can save you a surprising amount of time.

I’d treat these upgrades as part of your long-term progression rather than something to completely ignore.

There are several different upgrades available, including:

• Speed

• Carry amount

• Drone amount

• Battery size

• Player carry size

• Farm upgrades

• Tool upgrades

• Luck upgrades

You don’t necessarily need to max everything immediately.

I’d prioritize upgrades based on how you’re actually playing.

These are one of the biggest priorities because they directly improve your ability to produce ingredients.

A larger carrying capacity means fewer trips back and forth while harvesting.

If you’re constantly getting the “backpack full” message, this becomes especially useful.

Movement speed can make the entire farming and restaurant loop quicker.

You’re going to be running between your farm, cooking area, and customers constantly, so speed upgrades can save time.

Luck becomes more useful when you’re trying to get better or different seeds.

If you keep rolling the same basic crops, this is the upgrade I’d start considering.

The game also includes drone-related upgrades, including drone amount and battery size. These are worth improving as you progress and start making greater use of the automation systems.

There’s an Index system in the game, and you should check it regularly.

The gameplay specifically recommends filling out the Index because completing entries can help you obtain items.

Even if you’re focused entirely on making money, it’s worth keeping track of the things you’ve discovered rather than ignoring the system.

Whenever you unlock or discover something new, check your Index and see whether there’s anything you can claim.

Your backpack can fill up surprisingly quickly.

When it’s full, don’t just keep trying to harvest more crops. Take those ingredients back and turn them into food.

The gameplay repeatedly uses this cycle:

Backpack full → Return to the pot → Cook → Serve → Collect cash

This is much more efficient than letting your harvested ingredients sit around while your crops continue growing.

If you’re constantly hitting your backpack limit, that’s also a sign that your carry capacity upgrade could be useful.

Once you’ve unlocked multiple crops, start experimenting with them instead of relying entirely on the first ingredient you obtained.

For example, the gameplay starts with carrots, then adds beets and onions, and eventually unlocks lettuce.

The goal isn’t simply to have a garden full of different plants. You want those ingredients to contribute toward making better dishes that customers will pay more for.

So as soon as you unlock a new crop, test it.

See what kind of food you can make with it and how much that food sells for.

If a new ingredient significantly increases your payout, it should become part of your regular farming rotation.

You’ll also encounter events that can affect your farm.

During the gameplay, a sandstorm appeared, and there was some concern that it might affect the crops.

If an environmental event happens, don’t panic and assume you’ve lost all your progress.

Keep an eye on your crops and continue your normal routine. The important thing is to understand that these events can interfere with your farming, so don’t base your entire strategy around having a perfectly uninterrupted harvest cycle.

If you want a straightforward route to follow without overthinking every purchase, I’d go with this:

1. Start growing carrots.

Get your basic farm producing ingredients immediately.

2. Cook and serve constantly.

Don’t let harvested ingredients sit in your backpack.

3. Reinvest your money.

Use your first earnings on upgrades that improve production and efficiency.

4. Work toward better seeds.

Use seed rolls and consider luck upgrades when you’re struggling to get different crops.

5. Unlock the $400 plot.

More farming space means more production.

6. Work toward onions and other better crops.

Higher-quality ingredients can help you produce more valuable food.

7. Unlock lettuce when possible.

The gameplay shows lettuce becoming another important upgrade in the early progression.

8. Save toward the $700 backyard expansion.

Don’t waste the money you’re saving on unnecessary purchases.

9. Improve your tools and carrying capacity.

These upgrades make harvesting and transporting ingredients much easier.

10. Keep upgrading the farm.

Your farm is ultimately what keeps your restaurant supplied. If I were starting over, I’d keep things very simple.

Get your first crops growing, turn them into food, serve your customers, and immediately reinvest the money into the systems that increase production.

Then start working toward better seeds, bigger farming areas, better tools, and useful upgrades.

The biggest progression jump comes when you stop thinking of the game as just “run a restaurant” and start treating it as a production chain. Your farm creates the ingredients, your cooking station turns them into meals, and your customers turn those meals into cash.

Once that cycle is running smoothly, the money starts coming in much faster.

And honestly, that’s the satisfying part of Automate a Restaurant—watching a tiny garden with a couple of carrots slowly turn into a much bigger operation that can produce increasingly valuable food.