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Icelander
Master of Realmslore
1864 Posts |
 Posted - 22 Sep 2019 : 22:50:12
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Despite some mentions in 2e lore of Maztican chilis as expensive and exotic spices in Faerun, it is clear that various Heartland and Inner Sea cuisines make use of hot spices of some kind, whether they are in the capsicum family or not.
I've seen Ed mention peppers, even bell peppers*, in recipies, but it's not clear to me whether that refers only to a real world substitute for something else or if some varieties of capsicum peppers actually grow on Faerun.
Does anyone have thoughts?
What spices make Turmish food hot and where are they grown?
Does any Realms cuisine feature spicy stews like Texas chili con carne or paprika-seasoned ones like goulash?
Do Realms equivalents to bell peppers, sweet peppers or hot peppers exist outside Maztica and if so, where are they grown and who likes to use them?
Are there uniquely Realmsian spices that are hot in the way capsicum-based spices from Earth are?
Do dwarves or orcs use centipede venom as a seasoning (perhaps because it helps preserve food)?
*In the real world, a modern 20th century cultivar of peppers originally found only in the Americas.
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Ayrik
Great Reader
Canada
7970 Posts |
Posted - 23 Sep 2019 : 00:36:26
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Planescape offers some spicy and exotic flavourings which would burn anyone unaccustomed to Lower Planar cuisine. Spelljammer is supposedly built on a backbone of merchant traffic between spheres and worlds.
I don't know if Maztican chili peppers would be known to the Heartlands (especially after Maztica, ahem, disappeared in 4E) ... but spices from Thay or Shou might be available.
Spice merchants are a favourite staple in fantasy fiction. The perfect cover for spies and adventurers, lightweight cargo which can buy or sell a steady supply of coin at every stop on the road.
The Realms has grown a lot since the AD&D era, but back then you could expect to pay about 5 coppers per pound of salt, twice as much for pepper, and no other flavourings were really available unless you knew some herbalism or alchemy. |
[/Ayrik] |
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Icelander
Master of Realmslore
1864 Posts |
Posted - 23 Sep 2019 : 01:09:21
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quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Planescape offers some spicy and exotic flavourings which would burn anyone unaccustomed to Lower Planar cuisine. Spelljammer is supposedly built on a backbone of merchant traffic between spheres and worlds.
Well, yes, but trade with other planes or crystal spheres is probably so rare and expensive that any flavorings acquired in that way would be one-off exotics for the table of the fantastically rich, not an established and recognizable part of the cuisine in any part of the Realms.
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
I don't know if Maztican chili peppers would be known to the Heartlands (especially after Maztica, ahem, disappeared in 4E)
I only run campaigns set prior to that, so 4e is not a concern.
Of course, any imports from Maztica will be new and expensive in the 1360-1370 DR era and hardly incorporated into any cuisines as anything other than fads among the wealthy, but along the Sword Coast and the Shining South, at least, there is the potential for the importation of large volumes of Maztican spices in the holds of galleons, eventually making them available to the middle class.
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
... but spices from Thay or Shou might be available.
Spices from Thay are likely to be widespread on the shores of the Inner Sea and it would be interesting to know more about what sort of spices those would be, both real world equivalents and unique Realmsian ones.
Spices from Kara Tur are unlikely to be competatively priced compared to any reasonable equivalent available from an area where almost a year's travel by caravan is not necessary. For the exotic cachet and conspicious consumption by kings and millionaires (in gp), yes, spices from Shou Lung are cool. For everyone else, find something that tastes vaguely similar, but can be grown somewhere there is regular ship traffic with your home.
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Spice merchants are a favourite staple in fantasy fiction. The perfect cover for spies and adventurers, lightweight cargo which can buy or sell a steady supply of coin at every stop on the road.
Indeed.
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
The Realms has grown a lot since the AD&D era, but back then you could expect to pay about 5 coppers per pound of salt, twice as much for pepper, and no other flavourings were really available unless you knew some herbalism or alchemy.
Wow, that's cheap for pepper!
Simplistic rules aside, in plausible Realmslore, any kind of trade good ought to be a lot more expensive in places a long, difficult and risky travel from where it is grown or made. So pepper should be least expensive, by far, where it grows naturally, much more expensive a long sea voyage away from these places and infinitely more expensive anywhere it needs to be brought a long way overland.
Seriously, land transport powered by beasts of burden is astronomically expensive compared to ocean transport. Seaports can afford to eat imports, but anywhere far inland, only the indencently wealthy can even imagine doing so. And any trade goods that must be transported overland for huge distances will as a consequence be practical only as something marketed to great nobles or merchant princes, for conspicious consumption.
In the real world, the use of a given imported spice by 'ordinary' nobility, gentry and the richest among commoners correlates strongly with the establishment of a regular oceanic trade route with its area of origin. And once these routes can handle large volumes, even the middle class begins to use the formerly exotic spices, which by then are still expensive compared to where they grow naturally, but no longet astronomically so. |
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Edited by - Icelander on 23 Sep 2019 01:52:40 |
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doccarnby
Acolyte
16 Posts |
Posted - 23 Sep 2019 : 01:48:52
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As Ayrik said, I wouldn't be surprised if there's a spice trade from the Utter East and along the Golden Way. Green Calishite is noted as being made with curries, for example. Of course, perhaps there's plenty of hot spices that grow naturally around Faerun. Or they became popular enough through trade that people used magic or something to try to recreate them and avoid having to rely so heavily on possibly unreliable traders. Or heck, maybe some Netherese arcanist coming back from a jaunt into Realmspace thought "huh, I should check out that huge continent over there before I head back, maybe there's something neat there" and brought back the spices that are now considered native to Faerun, but time, human agricultural practices, the collapse of empires, and natural or artificial adaptation have led to the spices differentiating themselves from the original stock back in Maztica.
Unfortunately for canon diving, the FR Wiki doesn't have particularly deep pages on food and drink, a lot of it is sourced from Aurora's and therefore the descriptions are rather sparse. It would be interesting to see a real look into the cuisine of the Realms, but it probably isn't the kind of thing that'd shift lots of books (though "Elminster's Cookbooks" feels like it'd be a nice companion to "Elminster's Ecologies"). |
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Ayrik
Great Reader
Canada
7970 Posts |
Posted - 23 Sep 2019 : 02:18:39
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I imagine that halflings would be the most avid connoisseurs of spices, herbs, and flavours worldwide. They might have all sorts of powdered cheese molds and sickly-sweet-tasting food additives. Humans might be the dominant race across Faerun but a lot of halflings can be found wherever humans build cities so humans will be exposed to a lot of halfling preferences.
Elves might have rarefied and subtly nuanced selections which involve semi-magical cultivation techniques. Drow might have darker variations, alongside much lore about which spices can disguise or reveal the flavours of poisons.
Dwarves are generally happy eating manly meaty cardboard, although some might enjoy especially potent (and toxic) varieties of fermented mushroom juice. Maybe they like to sprinkle their food with certain varieties of ground up ores and minerals.
Druids and rangers might use all sorts of natural ingredients for taste. Plant leaves, seeds, berries, barks, bugs, beast organs.
Bards might develop familiarity with exotic flavourings.
Wizards and priests might observe all sorts of mystical dietary restrictions, including unusual spiced to simply make their awful foodstuffs less unpalatable.
Most monsters seem to eat whatever they can get (including humans and each other) and some (like illithids or vampires) have utterly inhuman dietary needs. But a few species (like kobolds, goblins, and dragons) have developed enough "culture" to cultivate their own unique tastes. |
[/Ayrik] |
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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
USA
36779 Posts |
Posted - 23 Sep 2019 : 02:33:49
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| There would likely be a lot of alternative, similar-to-but-not-quite-the-same-as spices from other sources, as well. Maybe there's a particular Underdark mushroom that can be dried and ground up into something like vanilla, or a tree that has a bark that is milder than but similar to cinnamon, or a particular lichen found in mountainous regions that is very similar to turmeric. |
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Icelander
Master of Realmslore
1864 Posts |
Posted - 23 Sep 2019 : 10:01:13
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quote:
Originally posted by Wooly Rupert
There would likely be a lot of alternative, similar-to-but-not-quite-the-same-as spices from other sources, as well. Maybe there's a particular Underdark mushroom that can be dried and ground up into something like vanilla, or a tree that has a bark that is milder than but similar to cinnamon, or a particular lichen found in mountainous regions that is very similar to turmeric.
Indeed.
The famous mingari spice of Ulgarth is apparently similar to cinnamon* in flavour, for example.
Does anyone know of other, similar examples, especially as it relates to hot and spicy flavours that are used around the Inner Sea?
*Although, apparently, cinnamon itself also exists in the Realms, at least a Google search linked with Ed Greenwood's name yields a plethora of references to it in replies apparently having to do with the Sword Coast and in the Heartlands. |
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Icelander
Master of Realmslore
1864 Posts |
Posted - 23 Sep 2019 : 10:23:06
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quote:
Originally posted by doccarnby
As Ayrik said, I wouldn't be surprised if there's a spice trade from the Utter East and along the Golden Way.
Sure, as long as everyone realizes that transporting something overland the distance between Suzail and Arabel is more expensive than transporting it by sea from Maztica to Waterdeep.
The difference between ocean-going and overland transport costs is more than an order of magnitude, it approaches two orders of magnitude. Which means that overland trade will usually be a negligible factor when it comes to any usable volume of trade goods. It can establish exchange of ideas and even people, but unless there is a sailing route, only kings and similar can afford to actually buy anything that needs to be carried thousands of miles overland.
There is a reason Shou merchants are utterly indifferent to trade with Faerun. It's because it has more in common with adventuring than regular trade. Daredevil venturers travel between continents with various curiosities that appeal to the fantastically rich, but the operating costs are too prohibitive to compete with regular shipments of anything.
The Utter East, of course, is a more practical proposition, as even the very long sea route from there the Shining Lands and the Shining Lands to the Sword Coast is far cheaper than any overland route between countries.
quote:
Originally posted by doccarnby
Green Calishite is noted as being made with curries, for example.
'Curry' just means 'sauce [for rice]', so the existence of 'curries' doesn't establish anything specific about what kind of spices are involved, any more than 'dry rub' or 'stew' tells us anything about the kind of seasonings used.
quote:
Originally posted by doccarnby
Of course, perhaps there's plenty of hot spices that grow naturally around Faerun. Or they became popular enough through trade that people used magic or something to try to recreate them and avoid having to rely so heavily on possibly unreliable traders. Or heck, maybe some Netherese arcanist coming back from a jaunt into Realmspace thought "huh, I should check out that huge continent over there before I head back, maybe there's something neat there" and brought back the spices that are now considered native to Faerun, but time, human agricultural practices, the collapse of empires, and natural or artificial adaptation have led to the spices differentiating themselves from the original stock back in Maztica.
It seems that cooks in Faerun must have had access to hot spices long before the discovery of Maztica, because canon mentions spicy dishes that are part of regional cuisines (e.g. in Turmish), which the newly discovered Maztican chilies wouldn't have had time to become.
I'm looking for lore on sources of hot, burning, spicy seasonings around the Inner Sea in the 1350-1370 DR era.
quote:
Originally posted by doccarnby
Unfortunately for canon diving, the FR Wiki doesn't have particularly deep pages on food and drink, a lot of it is sourced from Aurora's and therefore the descriptions are rather sparse. It would be interesting to see a real look into the cuisine of the Realms, but it probably isn't the kind of thing that'd shift lots of books (though "Elminster's Cookbooks" feels like it'd be a nice companion to "Elminster's Ecologies").
Ed has discussed cooking, recipies, cuisines and other things extensively, but unfortunately, the Search function here only yields scrolls, not the specific page reference, which makes it difficult to find nuggets of Ed-lore.
Hence, this scroll, in case other scribes have better memories than I or have perhaps kept notes on the subject. |
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Barastir
Master of Realmslore
Brazil
1600 Posts |
Posted - 24 Sep 2019 : 12:11:34
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Have you checked the Aurora's Whole Realms Catalogue?
EDIT: You must check also the 2e Volo's Guides... Some of them have local recipes, some quite spicy.
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"Goodness is not a natural state, but must be
fought for to be attained and maintained.
Lead by example.
Let your deeds speak your intentions.
Goodness radiated from the heart."
The Paladin's Virtues, excerpt from the "Quentin's Monograph"
(by Ed Greenwood) |
Edited by - Barastir on 24 Sep 2019 12:12:50 |
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doccarnby
Acolyte
16 Posts |
Posted - 24 Sep 2019 : 22:41:58
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quote:
Originally posted by Icelander
Ed has discussed cooking, recipies, cuisines and other things extensively, but unfortunately, the Search function here only yields scrolls, not the specific page reference, which makes it difficult to find nuggets of Ed-lore.
Hence, this scroll, in case other scribes have better memories than I or have perhaps kept notes on the subject.
Fair enough. I've just quickly checked the 'So Sayeth Ed' index, and on June 10th, 2004 a question about Turmish fare was asked, which I found on page 40 of the 2004 questions thread. Curiously, the only local spice that would seem to apply is, to quote: "ground blackroot, which is like pepper". A quick look at the other years doesn't show much about more Turmish food, save for one mention that rice is probably grown there as well.
A quick search for "spice" brings up a few things, though spiciness is only mentioned once, on the 21st of September, 2008, when noting that the spices used when preserving fish in oil are explicitly not hot peppers, as that would overwhelm the flavour of the fish.
A search for "pepper" brings up a line about ale in Berdusk on June 24th, 2008, where an "orange-red, fiery [peppery] hard cider" is mentioned. On January 29th, 2009, it is mentioned that edible peppers are grown in the Tashalar. A quick search for 'chili' brought up nothing from 2004 to 2009.
As for the line about curry, I mentioned it because Calishite Green is noted for being spicy, and I would assume that the term 'curry' did not originate in Calimshan (though I haven't delved deep into the Lands of Intrigue), and would likely be an import, possibly from the Utter East. |
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shades of eternity
Learned Scribe
288 Posts |
Posted - 24 Sep 2019 : 23:25:35
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| I work under the assumption there were at least some attempts to plant some of these plants in colonies in the Chultan Peninsula and it went about as well as expected. :) |
check out my post-post apocalyptic world at www.drevrpg.com |
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Icelander
Master of Realmslore
1864 Posts |
Posted - 27 Sep 2019 : 13:55:27
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quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
I imagine that halflings would be the most avid connoisseurs of spices, herbs, and flavours worldwide. They might have all sorts of powdered cheese molds and sickly-sweet-tasting food additives. Humans might be the dominant race across Faerun but a lot of halflings can be found wherever humans build cities so humans will be exposed to a lot of halfling preferences.
That's a very good observation.
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Elves might have rarefied and subtly nuanced selections which involve semi-magical cultivation techniques. Drow might have darker variations, alongside much lore about which spices can disguise or reveal the flavours of poisons.
Indeed, it is canon that elves consider the strong spices that some humans enjoy crude and unappetizing.
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Dwarves are generally happy eating manly meaty cardboard, although some might enjoy especially potent (and toxic) varieties of fermented mushroom juice. Maybe they like to sprinkle their food with certain varieties of ground up ores and minerals.
I can see how the stereotype of dwarves not caring what food tasted like might arise, but if you think about it, the dwarven lifestyle is actually conductive to robust use of hot spices.
The average dwarf is a highly skilled and prosperous craftsman, with an accumulated wealth of decades if not hundreds of years, which makes an average dwarf as rich as an affluent human. However, dwarves tend to live in areas where access to fresh produce is not as easy as where the average human lives (the typical human lives on a farm).
This means that dwarves can afford expensive foodstuffs, but the relative cost of fresh food is much higher for them than for ordinary human farmers or fishermen. And one of the primary methods of increasing storage life of foodstuffs and making them palatable when they are less fresh is the use of spices that inhibit harmful microbe growth and compensates for lack of freshness.
If anyone makes an equivalent to chili con carne in the Realms, it should probably be dwarves, for example.
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Druids and rangers might use all sorts of natural ingredients for taste. Plant leaves, seeds, berries, barks, bugs, beast organs.
Bards might develop familiarity with exotic flavourings.
Wizards and priests might observe all sorts of mystical dietary restrictions, including unusual spiced to simply make their awful foodstuffs less unpalatable.
Of course, in the real world, all spices are natural ingredients. It's not as if we use supernatural spices in the real world.
In the Realms, powerful adventurers, nobles and other rich folk might, but the vast majority of people would still use seasonings that grow naturally.
quote:
Originally posted by Ayrik
Most monsters seem to eat whatever they can get (including humans and each other) and some (like illithids or vampires) have utterly inhuman dietary needs. But a few species (like kobolds, goblins, and dragons) have developed enough "culture" to cultivate their own unique tastes.
Any 'monstrous' race that uses metal weapons implicitly has a material culture as complex as thousands of years of human history. Orcs and goblinkin, simply by virtue of being able to make steel swords and mail, have achieved an advanced civilization that is, for example, more technologically sophisticated than a thousand years of recorded Chinese or Fertile Crescent history.
While cultures do not demonstrate a uniform level of material and technological sophistication in all fields, it is nevertheless very plausible that along with the metallurgy and smithcraft to make such advanced metal arms would come advances in domestic technologies like cooking ovens and other implements. I'd assume orcs have technologies for brewing beer, distilling liquor*, making wine and pretty much all cooking techniques known to Iron Age cultures of similar lifestyles.
*This is actually very advanced technology in Earth history, unknown to anyone but very learned alchemists over most of the medieval era, but it is canon in the Realms that many ordinary farmers distill strong liquor and have done for centuries, if not millennia. |
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Chilis, Peppers and Hot Spices in the Realms
