Clearing out a town of zombies, though certainly a daunting task, if very much worth the effort. If you plan on clearing out a town, go for a small one with less than 15 buildings. Take your time, don’t go to fast. Somewhere in town you should define a place that will be your outpost, from which you can store your loot. A cleared out town often provides a great deal of goods to help extend your life, from clothes that you can, at the very least, cut up into plastic, to enough food to last you through the season.
Go raid a lab, you’ll find more ammonia that you’ll ever use. Bring a car. You’ll find a LOT of ammonia (and batteries. And salt water for cooking. Plus CBMs, mutagens, purifiers… ) Labs are awesome and mostly risk-free. Just turn off the flashlight whenever you meet a turret, get 2 tiles away and shoot it from there (or close the door and never go into that room again).
You say you are only level 4 at cooking ; just go hunt down some big animal, and cook each piece of him. Your skill will rise really quickly, not hard to get more than 10 at it.
Usually you may fail a lot just when you have the requirment of the craft. Just increase it to +2, and it should be fine.
Try to invest in your throwing skills; create pointy sticks (they are super easy to make) or find rocks (they are surprisingly great weapons). I pretty much fight zombies always from afar, I only use melee attacks to deliver the final blow.
A makeshift crowbar is your best friend, especially early on. It opens locked doors and good for melee damage.
Map the town at day and raid it at night. Since I followed this strategy, I eliminated any possibility of me dying within the first two days. I highly recommend using the “night vision” trait to make your life easier.
In options, change starting game time to 5 AM. it will be dark a bit at first but gives you more daylight to explore. Wander far and wide outside. stay out of town. your goal is to look primarily for corpses, but mark trap locations. Sometimes these locations have items. your primary goal is to find some bottled water and some clothing with pockets. everything else is secondary. the farther you wander day #1 the higher the likelihood of finding stuff. I can usually find a few sets of corpses and enough water to get me through a day or two.
early game… only eat strawberries, blueberries, and applies. they contain a small amount of water. food is not the issue early, its water. so pick up and eat. dont bother carrying. there are plenty to be found.
always carry 3 rocks with you. so if you run into something you can atleast do 3 rock throws to damage. throw rocks at forest animals and butcher to train survival and throwing. survival at 2 is critical for making a stone pot to purify water.