Chocolate, Potatoes & Tomatoes

I have a question about the foods that are available in Golarion. Would food items such as Avocados, Chili Peppers, Chocolate, Maize (corn), Potatoes, Tomatoes, and Turkey meat (and other food items I failed to list) exist on Golarion?

On our Earth items (as well as Llama and Alpaca wool) are native to the "New World" and were unknown in Europe until the Spanish started setting there.

What lead me to this question is an odd reference in The Skinsaw Murders

So, are these items available? Or is there an analog to the Americas out there on Golarion waiting to be discovered?

My honest thoughts,

I think that is excuse enough.

Between you and me, it's also a world design trick. If we start comparing pre-renaissance population and food supply models to fantasy gaming, it doesn't work. "It is magic" doesn't work either, because who grows wants to be known as the "Bread Mage" when there are more lucrative specializations for magic. Local druids and priests of agriculture help, but they cannot support hundreds of thousands by themselves.

So, you break that population model in the most rational and logical way possible. Place many “Staple foods” available to be grown on the same continent or geographic region as possible. Seeds travel, especially when we have huge ancient empires from thousands of years ago.

Staple foods have to be high in calorie value, and easy to grow assuming you have the right conditions.

Your Staple foods are;
Cereals- Wheat, Barley, Rye (grown in medieval Europe) Rice, and Maize.
Root Vegetables – Poatatoes, Yams, and that stuff that you boil/mash/stick in a stew
Legumes – Beans, peas, lentis, etc…. (some grown in medieval Europe)
Other stuff that English speaking countries are not used to consuming: example Bread Fruit.

So, since we don’t know much about bread fruit, the easiest way to support large populations in a fantasy world is to give Rice, Maize and Potatoes to your semi-European cultures.

Bonus points if you intoduce sanitation.

So, are these items available? Or is there an analog to the Americas out there on Golarion waiting to be discovered?

Have you looked into Arcadia? It's the "undiscovered America" analogue, but I don't know if it's the source of new vegetation for the rest of Golarion. While it's cool to think of the migration of different plants through exploration and trade with new continents, it's a lot more simulationist than I ever get in my own games. If the players want to eat corn, it's probably available, regardless of the real world history of the plant. Also, it would take hundreds of years for a new vegetable to make its way throughout the Inner Sea region, so unless you've got a party of long-lived elves, you might never get to see a new plant show up at the local tavern.

I know a fair bit about the real world spread of genomes, and the process of husbandry that made most real world crops. I find that knowing actually gets in the way, and takes my brain in strange dissonances, so I came up with a very elegant solution for Golarion.

The Azlanti did it.

Azlant had magic sufficient to map the globe of Golarion, invent clockworks, pioneer magics, create countless species of weird stuff that ignores all sane linnaean classification, and get tomatoes or strawberries in season all year round. Now the plants have spread wild.

Same for animals. The game references a mash-up of creatures from different biomes and continents. Seriously, it goes way beyond any reasonable attempt to map a biosphere would.

Basically, I assume the Azlanti wrecked the ecosystem of every continent with reckless importation of invader species, portals, menageries, pets, magical cloning and other absolutely awful practices.

That way, my sensible real world knowledge doesn't jar me out of suspension of disbelief when I see the mistakes in the setting.

Taliesin, I think you have an important point about suspension of disbelief belief here. If the requisite verisimilitude for any participant is lacking, then the next step may be not to change everything, but to come up with a satisfactory explanation that will restore the appearance of verisimilitude and allow that participant to suspend disbelief.

I have been ranting about the problems such things cause with suspension of disbelief for years.
It is nice to see others have the same feelings as I do about it.

And a nice explanation. Given the scope of the Azlanti and length of time, significant introduced species could easily exist. I wonder what country has been completely overrun with kudzu. :-P

One of the design philosophies of Golarion is that we don't change things to be different from the real world unless we have to. That's why Golarion has one moon, is about the same size as Earth, has 24 hour days, has 7 day weeks, and has 30 day months (ok... that's a little different, but not really).

The same goes for food. All of the food types you listed in the original post are available in Golarion, as are clothing items. Some are more exotic than others, sure, but for the most part the people on Golarion are MUCH more well-traveled than the folks of the world in the medieval days were. They may not have jets and cars, but they certainly do have wind walk, teleport, shadow walk, and the like.

If/when we do introduce strange new exotic foods, they'll probably be brand new foods. We don't want to keep a list of what foods we can and can't idly mention from the real world because that rule will get broken too many times. In the case of a fantasy author who has control over his world and is basically the only person who'll ever write for his world, he can start doing strange things like making turnips exotic foods, or making chocolate a strange and mysterious import. But for a shared RPG world, which has half a dozen editors and dozens, if not hundreds of different authors of different skills, it's not so easy or logical a choice to make.

That said, the author/developer/editor is only part of the equation. Nothing we do directly contacts players, in question, since GMs are the ones who present the world to the players. If you, as a GM, want chocolate to be exotic, go for it! Since you're the only one who decides what's in and out of your world, you can keep track of those kinds of changes a LOT more easily than a small army of writers and editors can. (And if you mess up, only a small handful of people will ever know, and you can pretty easily contact all of those people and correct the error swiftly and surely if you want.)

...hastily scratches out chutney from his latest submission...

marzipan is quite popular though...

One more thing, though... In some remote and obscure parts of Golarion, we WILL probably rule that some food types are exotic. But so far, all of our adventure paths have taken place in areas that aren't obscure. Varisia and Katapesh are on major trade routes, and are pretty cosmopolitan compared to, say, Irrisen or the deep Mwangi.

I have been ranting about the problems such things cause with suspension of disbelief for years.

It is nice to see others have the same feelings as I do about it.

And a nice explanation. Given the scope of the Azlanti and length of time, significant introduced species could easily exist. I wonder what country has been completely overrun with kudzu. :-P

Heh...if you ever take a break from any of your debates, Sam, and want to read another's ranting, you can probably find most (but not all) of my rants on this and related subjects by searching "Gygaxian Naturalism".

As usual, good stuff from Jacobs.

Heh...if you ever take a break from any of your debates, Sam, and want to read another's ranting, you can probably find most (but not all) of my rants on this and related subjects by searching "Gygaxian Naturalism".

Heh. I sort of avoided that thread because typically when I mention such things, I get obnoxiouslly dismissed or gratuitously insulted or both for even daring to suggest people might consider such factors an issue. I expect my responses to such can be guessed. ;)

(Addition)
Ah, that is right.
I was commenting in the middle, but the elements I was commenting on were drifting too far afield, and rather than threadjack with rants against "that" essay, or the 4E "question", I let the thread go.

Ah, that is right.

I was commenting in the middle, but the elements I was commenting on were drifting too far afield, and rather than threadjack with rants against "that" essay, or the 4E "question", I let the thread go.

That's right...your concern was with those who were arguing based off of stuff in the Greyhawk setting, rather than the core books. I remember now, and that was actually pretty helpful to me, as my only knowledge of Greyhawk was from the rule books and modules, having never used the setting material. Also, to be honest, my concern was more with naturalism/verisimilitude than it was with Gygax.

One of the design philosophies of Golarion is that we don't change things to be different from the real world unless we have to. That's why Golarion has one moon, is about the same size as Earth, has 24 hour days, has 7 day weeks, and has 30 day months (ok... that's a little different, but not really).

The same goes for food. All of the food types you listed in the original post are available in Golarion, as are clothing items. Some are more exotic than others, sure, but for the most part the people on Golarion are MUCH more well-traveled than the folks of the world in the medieval days were. They may not have jets and cars, but they certainly do have wind walk, teleport, shadow walk, and the like.

But, that's the thing. If you are not changing things from the "Real World" unless you have to, then food items such as Avocados, Chili Peppers, Chocolate, Maize (corn), Potatoes, Tomatoes, and Turkey should be exotic.

On Earth in Medieval days, should food weren't just exotic, they were simply unavailable.

That's right...your concern was with those who were arguing based off of stuff in the Greyhawk setting, rather than the core books. I remember now, and that was actually pretty helpful to me, as my only knowledge of Greyhawk was from the rule books and modules, having never used the setting material. Also, to be honest, my concern was more with naturalism/verisimilitude than it was with Gygax.

It is a bit more. As with the other recent thread about Golarion and "Old School", I simply reject the premise that "Old School", and by extension "Gygaxian Naturalism", can be defined exclusively within the context of a single product, portion of a product line, or indeed even selections from within specific products, while casually handwaving any contradictions within the entire body of work, the context of its presentation, or the evolution of role-playing in general.

See?
I am already starting to rant.
:-P

But, that's the thing. If you are not changing things from the "Real World" unless you have to, then food items such as Avocados, Chili Peppers, Chocolate, Maize (corn), Potatoes, Tomatoes, and Turkey should be exotic.

On Earth in Medieval days, should food weren't just exotic, they were simply unavailable.

Yes, but using the scenario suggested by Taliesin Hoyle, there are many examples of foods being adopted on a massive scale once introduced. In fact, maize and potatoes are two of the biggest examples of that.

James Jacobs wrote:

One of the design philosophies of Golarion is that we don't change things to be different from the real world unless we have to. That's why Golarion has one moon, is about the same size as Earth, has 24 hour days, has 7 day weeks, and has 30 day months (ok... that's a little different, but not really).

But, that's the thing. If you are not changing things from the "Real World" unless you have to, then food items such as Avocados, Chili Peppers, Chocolate, Maize (corn), Potatoes, Tomatoes, and Turkey should be exotic.

On Earth in Medieval days, should food weren't just exotic, they were simply unavailable.

You're right, but in Earth of *now*, these foods are not unavailable or even exotic. Potatoes are the main vegetable of Germany for instance - and Italy without tomatoes? I'm fairly sure it was changing from the real world of "now", not of the past.

marzipan is quite popular though...

Entire tureens of it, yes?

Marzipan...was there ever a more horrific waste of sugar and almond extract?

On the positive side, it's cheaply made sculpture, sometimes of surprisingly impressive quality, as long as you don't eat it.
___________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________
Sam, why don't you join in that thread?

Shoanti love fried grilled cheese sammich's.

The Azlanti did it.

I think I will go with that answer for now. :D

James Jacobs wrote:

One of the design philosophies of Golarion is that we don't change things to be different from the real world unless we have to. That's why Golarion has one moon, is about the same size as Earth, has 24 hour days, has 7 day weeks, and has 30 day months (ok... that's a little different, but not really).

The same goes for food. All of the food types you listed in the original post are available in Golarion, as are clothing items. Some are more exotic than others, sure, but for the most part the people on Golarion are MUCH more well-traveled than the folks of the world in the medieval days were. They may not have jets and cars, but they certainly do have wind walk, teleport, shadow walk, and the like.

But, that's the thing. If you are not changing things from the "Real World" unless you have to, then food items such as Avocados, Chili Peppers, Chocolate, Maize (corn), Potatoes, Tomatoes, and Turkey should be exotic.

On Earth in Medieval days, should food weren't just exotic, they were simply unavailable.

Golarion isn't an approximation of medieval Europe though, so that comparison is flawed from the start. There are PARTS of Golarion inspired by medieval Europe, but also parts inspired by the rennisanse, ancient rome, Atlantis, Hyperborea, Egypt, India, Africa, and so on.

So what was available on Earth in medieval days doesn't really matter... and even then, I suspect that during Europe's medieval period, avocados and chocolate and potatoes and tomatoes and turkey and maize/corn and chili peppers WERE available... just not in Europe. The Inner Sea region comprises an area MUCH larger than Europe.

Richard Pett wrote:

marzipan is quite popular though...

Entire tureens of it, yes?

My dear Demiurge - huzzah!

Scuttles back to his dictionary of ridiculous words...

Demiurge 1138 wrote:

Richard Pett wrote:

marzipan is quite popular though...

Entire tureens of it, yes?

My dear Demiurge - huzzah!

Scuttles back to his dictionary of ridiculous words...

And take your proboscis with you, elitist!

There's a long tradition of this. Tolkien put potatoes in the Hobbit, and even called them potatoes, and also put in pipeweed, which was either tobacco or alternately marijuana, which would explain the constant Hobbit munchies....

In any case, this sort of thing goes on. I'm running my players through a somewhat medieval Europe, but I just described tulips, because tulips are iconic spring flowers, nevermind the fact that they're originally from Persia and only got into Europe around the time of the tulip madness in Holland.

Part of the joy of a fantasy world is that you don't have to be completely accurate for everything, because it's an alternate world and things can have come about another way than they did on this one. In Golarion, instead of being selectively bred from bromeliads by the Incas, pineapples were created by the goddess Lamashtu. Admittedly she was trying to cross a pine tree with an apple tree to make some sort of giant battlebriar dryad horror thingummy, but she gave them to the goblins and they use them to beat cats and eat them for a snack afterwards (the cats and the pineapples, together), so it's not a total loss.

Ever been to a goblin luau?

So what was available on Earth in medieval days doesn't really matter... and even then, I suspect that during Europe's medieval period, avocados and chocolate and potatoes and tomatoes and turkey and maize/corn and chili peppers WERE available... just not in Europe. The Inner Sea region comprises an area MUCH larger than Europe.

Everything on James' list (except tomatoes) would have been unknown in Europe prior to 1492. However they were well known in the Americas, which did not suddenly spring into existence when Columbus arrived.

Tomatoes are a funny case, because they were known in Europe for centuries, but being part of the nightshade family were considered poisonous throughout much of the medieval period.

My wife is a medieval/renaissance food history expert; her food history website is >here< if you care to do more research.

So what was available on Earth in medieval days doesn't really matter... and even then, I suspect that during Europe's medieval period, avocados and chocolate and potatoes and tomatoes and turkey and maize/corn and chili peppers WERE available... just not in Europe. The Inner Sea region comprises an area MUCH larger than Europe.

All of them were certainly available in the Western hemisphere, which would be the equivalent to off the map in the current setting. In the

Some rough dating, trusting Wikipedia:
Potatoes - 1536
Chocolate - 1585
Chili - 1494
Avocado - 1518
Tomato - 1544 and probably earlier
Corn - 1515 and probably earlier (can also mean other grains, explaining some very early mentions)
Turkey - 1530

Compare to:
Sextant - 1731
Telescope (i.e. spyglass) - 1608
Piano - 1700
Modern-style chess - 1475
Rapiers - 1500+

Not sure what point is here, except that worrying about anachronism is a waste of energy...the game is rife with it, and it doesn't hurt, particularly as it is fantasy rather than period.

(Note - I'm curious as to the source of the tomato existing in Europe earlier than Columbus. Belladona and other nightshades certainly did exist in Europe, but the genetics of the tomatoes we eat are all from the Americas).

(Note - I'm curious as to the source of the tomato existing in Europe earlier than Columbus. Belladona and other nightshades certainly did exist in Europe, but the genetics of the tomatoes we eat are all from the Americas).

Mea culpa -- I was misremembering a conversation with my wife many years ago.

Here's Cariadoc's Miscellany (David Friedman) on tomatoes in Europe:

The first European reference to the tomato is apparently one in a book published in Venice in 1544; it describes the tomato as having been brought to Italy "in our time" and eaten in Italy "fried in oil and with salt and pepper." It appears from later references that tomatoes were used as food in both Spain and Italy from the 1500's on.

Here's the source of my misremembrance, from Food In Antiquity by Don and Patricia Brothwell:

In the United States, the tomato was grown as an ornamental plant, but for a long time it was believed to be poisonous, so that it was being eaten in Europe much sooner than in North America, where it was not cultivated to any extent until after the Declaration of Independence.

Delabarre, hats off to you and the Missus. Was this avoidance of the tomato only among N. Americans of European origin, or did it extend to the American Indian population?

Delabarre, hats off to you and the Missus. Was this avoidance of the tomato only among N. Americans of European origin, or did it extend to the American Indian population?

I presume that the Brothwells are only referring to the colonials, but that does not indicate either way for the native Americans.

Mairkurion {tm} wrote:

Delabarre, hats off to you and the Missus. Was this avoidance of the tomato only among N. Americans of European origin, or did it extend to the American Indian population?

I presume that the Brothwells are only referring to the colonials, but that does not indicate either way for the native Americans.

As far as anyone can determine, it looks like Mexico was the northern limit for cultivation of ancestral tomatoes. It didn't spread into the Eastern Woodlands cultures.

So, yes, tomatoes were eaten by North Americans (not sure if this covers your "American Indian" question or not).

CJ

PS: I'm sure the AnTir Culinary Guild has got this information stowed somewhere online delabarre.

Yes, I think that does cover the American Indian--at least some of them. (I wonder if I am now sitting near the limit of that--what was then--a Mexican northern limit...)

If I remember my AnTir culinary meanderings, the poison association with tomatoes was more of a European thing, not necessarily a North/Central/South American thing. Mmm...tomatoes...

As an aside, what a culture's staples are depends very much on climate - colder regions with their typically shorter growing seasons subsisted on ryes and hard winter wheat, temperate regions wheat and potatoes, rainy areas rice, etc.

As a further aside - who the heck figured out the manioc/cassava thing? "Hey, these leaves are poisonous! Holy crap! ... Let's try the roots then. No? I know, let's cook the roots! Hey this is pretty good!"

If I remember my AnTir culinary meanderings, the poison association with tomatoes was more of a European thing, not necessarily a North/Central/South American thing.

I know, right?

As a further aside - who the heck figured out the manioc/cassava thing? "Hey, these leaves are poisonous! Holy crap! ... Let's try the roots then. No? I know, let's cook the roots! Hey this is pretty good!"

Reading from The Oxford Companion To Food, Chapter XI Verse 15 (I made the C&V up):

Cassava: Manihot esculenta...the original wild species from which the cultivated one evolved is, or are, lost or unrecognized. Selection of plants for cultivation would have been directed at reducing a serious disadvantage of the plant; that it contains two substances, a glucoside and an enzyme, which react together to produce poisonous prussic acid...prussic acid is easily soluble in water and driven off by heat, so the American Indians were able to evolve various soaking and heating processes to remove it. It was also the American Indians who bred the two main races of cassava.

ObDND: The Oxford Companion To Food is easily the size of a 1ED spellbook, weighing in around 5-6 pounds.

ObDND: The Oxford Companion To Food is easily the size of a 1ED spellbook, weighing in around 5-6 pounds.

I know, and it's one of the few historical food books I'm missing. ;_;

I know, and it's one of the few historical food books I'm missing. ;_;

So you're in the Madrone Cooks' Guild?

Lilith wrote:

I know, and it's one of the few historical food books I'm missing. ;_;

So you're in the Madrone Cooks' Guild?

No - haven't played in the SCA for years. But I still have my books and resources. :D

So...I still haven't found anybody on these boards who's made Millers in Onion Sauce. Did I just not know who the historical cooks were? ;)

No - haven't played in the SCA for years. But I still have my books and resources. :D

One of the interesting facts that I picked up (because of my wife's deep interest in food history) is that "American as" apple pie...isn't American at all; it's basically medieval German. :-D

This kind of thread is the reason i love the paizo community.

As a further aside - who the heck figured out the manioc/cassava thing? "Hey, these leaves are poisonous! Holy crap! ... Let's try the roots then. No? I know, let's cook the roots! Hey this is pretty good!"

I always felt that way about the first guy to eat a raw oyster. He must have been rather hungry.

Honestly, setting Arcadia aside, I've always thought that Varisia felt like it was the Golarion analogue to North America... um, but with native gypsies. You have a bold, new, frontier continent with a (mostly) temperate clime, still mostly dangerous, but fertile with wilderness and resources. You have the indigenous tribesmen, the Shoanti, pushed off their land. Heck, they even now dwell in the ashen wastes, where we can have lots of Wild West cowboys & Indians adventures (see the Cinderlander for a Badlands badguy. Seriously, it's hard to deny his cowboy-ishness.) Magnimar, Riddleport, and Korvosa are colonies of a country with an oppressive religion and government they no longer want anything to do with (well, except some Korvosians, but there were 'Redcoat' supporters in the Americas I expect.) There's even the Sandpoint Devil, a Jersey Devil analogue.

Of all fully detailed places in Golarion, Varisia seems like the ideal one for the origin point of maize and turkey to me. And if Varisia's part of a strongly established trade route to the rest of the inner sea, there's the point of distribution.

Hah hah hah, Drakli :) Are you an American by any chance? ;) (No offence intended of course :))

Because I am an European and I have always thought that Varisia and the whole Inner Sea Region was an almost perfect "copy" of Europe ;)

This is a great example of the phenomenon when everyone sees what is closer to him (if you are, indeed, an American ;))

Hah hah hah, Drakli :) Are you an American by any chance? ;) (No offence intended of course :))

Because I am an European and I have always thought that Varisia and the whole Inner Sea Region was an almost perfect "copy" of Europe ;)

This is a great example of the phenomenon when everyone sees what is closer to him (if you are, indeed, an American ;))

Heh. I'll cop to that. Good point. Yeah, I am American, if you won't hold it against me. ^.~

The inner Sea seems on the whole of European to me, but with some Declaration of Independence-ishness from Andoran. I tend to think of Varisia as more or less a separate continent and entity of untapped wilderness... which says New World to me.

Part of it, I think, is that the For some reason, when I think of the Shoanti, I keep thinking of Native Americans. It may just be that the (USA manifest destiny era) Native Americans are just the closest "Noble Savages displaced from their land." concept I have access to in my brain-space, but really, I think there is an influence there. When trying to explain Shoanti to my players, I always seem to fall back on using them as an analogy.

Also, seriously, the Cinderlander is totally a cowboy. n.n

Incidentally, please note the quotes above. I don't intend to suggest Native Americans are savages, just that it's a literary stereotype perpetuated for them, and the Shoanti seem aimed at that to me.

Ah. So you don't think we're really noble, either, huh? Oh...you're in trouble now!

As a further aside - who the heck figured out the manioc/cassava thing? "Hey, these leaves are poisonous! Holy crap! ... Let's try the roots then. No? I know, let's cook the roots! Hey this is pretty good!"

I think it's one of those things you learn from the animals. Like with acorns: "Hey, there's all sorts of nuts on this tree! Damn, they're bitter and taste like crap! Then why are the squirrels picking them? I dunno, they're tossing them in creek and pulling out the old soggy ones. Hey, the old soggy ones aren't bitter anymore...."

Someone probably saw a squirrel eating a waterlogged manioc root and not keeling over.

Ah. So you don't think we're really noble, either, huh? Oh...you're in trouble now!

Obsessive Compulsivity + Desire to be Political Correct = Two great tastes that go terrible with each other.

I am proof of that. n.n;

Folks, folks, folks. The current setting of Golarion is somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 years (I don't have my CS at work) after the collapse of several major and in some cases, continent spanning, imperial nation-states, with highly advanced technologies and epic-level spells at their disposal. Cultural inertia and climate intolerance are the only reason any domesticated plant or animal will not be truly catholic in distribution in such a world. Elf-gates add to this complexity in that wide-spread domestic foodstuffs may not even be native to the planet nevermind the local continent. The apocalypse which ended those major world-shaking empires then pretty much scuttled any decent record-keeping on what may or may not have been native to where, and there's been plenty of time for these domesticated plants and animals to go feral, making investigation difficult.

If humans have had any reason to move a breeding population of anything, anywhere in Golarion, as long as there isn't a better adapted competitor or the environment is hostile to the continued growth of that breeding population, it's gonna be there. Blame the Azlanti.

One of the interesting facts that I picked up (because of my wife's deep interest in food history) is that "American as" apple pie...isn't American at all; it's basically medieval German. :-D

A lot of American desserts come by way of the Pennsylvania Dutch, who are, of course, German and not Dutch at all.