I went full iron and used sausage/black soup/turnip stew, and that worked well for me. I skedaddled on out at night, though. Wasn't ready to take on fenrings at that time.

I had the same experience as you, once, electricdawn, where I died one time because I used improper food and then failed several parries on a 1 star wolf, and got staggered repeatedly. Not my finest hour :)