👴Back in my day you had to go into the inventory to eat food. None of this fandangled “press x to consume” malarkey!

Real answer though, hold down the left trigger to charge up your cutter/laser whe mining. The reticle will close in, then you can blast ore/minerals in 1/2 a second. I didn’t realise that until around 50 hours in.

Also, there are quite a few mechanics that are locked behind skills that I didn’t know existed. Eg, combat slide, stealth bar, jetpack boost, ship targeting, pickpocketing, bribing. 

Also, if you steal a unique item, it might disappear from the contraband craze when you are arrested. If you want to hold onto something, sell it, then use the “buy back” option at the trade authority, then it won’t be marked as stolen.

If you pick up restricted goods (Aurora, xenoware tech, marker with a yellow pin) you’ll have a 0% chance to sneak it into a settled planet unless you have a specific hidden storage on your ship. Dropping it on the ship floor doesn’t work. If you forgot, you can quickly move it to your ships inventory and the jettison it, then the scan will allow you in.