Tastes Like Chicken â Just what are your player characters eating, anyway?
Hullo, Gentle Readers. As I write this, Iâm already looking forward cooking turkey, my homemade cranberry-orange relish, dressing, mashed potatoes, and a ton of other delicious treats. With Thanksgiving almost upon us, I thought it might be fun to ponder what the diet of the average D&D character might look like.
Letâs start with a fundamental question â does their diet resemble that of medieval Europe? In many campaigns, the answer is a sort of qualified yes. Even our dear Professor Tolkien allowed some very exotic foods to sneak into the diet of hobbits. The ubiquitous âtaterâ is very much a food of the New World, to say nothing of âpipeweedâ. In my own campaign, pipe-smoking of plants such as swampleaf and brineweed is very much a thing, as are taters, and a highly-energizing drink called kaffĂ© is popular in some of the eastern regions. So I will assume that, like mine, your campaign introduces some not-period foods into the pseudo-medieval diet of your characters.
Letâs begin with that most basic of D&D foodstuffs, the trail rations. According to the Playerâs Handbook, rations include âjerky, dried fruit, hardtack, and nuts.â If weâre sticking to relatively accurate medieval Europe foods, the fruits would be things like figs, peaches, apples, prunes, and the like. Dried lemon and orange peel could be added, as these came from the Arabic countries around this time. Nuts would most likely include pine nuts, walnuts, hazelnuts, and almonds.
Hardtack, if youâve never had the pleasure of enjoying it, is a hard biscuit or cracker made primarily with flour, water, and sometimes salt. It could be eaten as is, softened by being dunked into something like soup, salt water, or whatever else was in hand, crumbled into soup to thicken it, broken up and cooked into other meals, etc. As long as itâs kept dry, it can literally last for years. So trail rations are, clearly, made to last for long periods of time.
A character living at a Wretched lifestyle would likely be starving most of the time. Food would either be castoffs found by picking through garbage or what they could get by begging from others. Hopefully the churches of your world offer some respite for those in desperate need, and they might be able to feed such a character gruel, which is oats, wheat, rice, or flour cooked in water or milk to make a very thin version of porridge, or soup made from old vegetables that were donated by wealthier folk.
Squalid folks arenât doing too much better. The quality of food probably isnât much better, but at least thereâs likely better access to it. There may be actual porridge at times, and access to gruel might be more frequent. Sometimes actual vegetables might be had. But these folks are still living on the edge of existence.
People living in a poor lifestyle are probably what we most often think about when we think of medieval peasants. At this level, meat is probably a rarity at best. On good days, there may be bread, rice, corn, or other cereals. Roasted vegetables like turnips, parsnips, taters, onions, carrots, gourds like Calabash, and eggplants would be common, as would greens like Swiss chard, spinach, and leeks. Porridge and gruel would still be a common staple. Meat would most likely be something only encountered on holidays, and even eggs and fish would be a bit of a rarity. Common fruits are likely a relatively frequent addition now, so you can enjoy apples, pears, grapes, and melons regularly. You might brew your own ale from grains now, ensuring you can have a drink when you wish.
Once you hit the Modest level of living, youâre doing much better. Gruel is likely slipping out of your diet, and bread is much more common. You might enjoy meat once a week, or even more, depending on your circumstances, and eggs and fish are probably a frequent addition to your diet. Soups and stews are common, the better to eke out all of the goodness of the animal that you got your meat from â those bones make excellent stock, and maybe youâre making your own cheese now. Delicious! You can have common fruit pretty much anytime you want, and perhaps, on holidays, an exotic fruit like an orange ends up on your plate, or a dish with lemon peel! And your veggie options probably now include some things like artichokes! You might make your own beer or ale, or even enjoy one at the pub on a fairly regular basis.
Ahhhh, Comfortable! This is an excellent place to be. You likely get to enjoy meat, eggs, and fish whenever you like, and youâre eating fine white bread now, rather than only being able to afford coarser breads, and you take cheese with it whenever you wish. If you want the occasional lemon, orange, quince, or other exotic fruits, itâs well within your grasp. You can drink wine regularly, or even mead. And maybe you take a pipe of leaf now and then after dinner.
Once you reach the Weathly level, it mostly manifests in more food and more exotic foods as well. Dinner is likely several courses on a regular basis, and you likely have several courses of meat and fish to vary your diet. You might enjoy sturgeon, fished from far-away streams, or venison, hunted from the woods. At the end of meals, there is likely a course of several cheeses, and maybe some small sweets to enjoy. Perhaps you have a wine cellar now, and you can talk about the advantages of an elven feywine, or a dwarven brandy.
Aristocratic folks pretty much enjoy whatever food and drink they want. Theyâve likely tried many exotic meats at feasts, such as owlbear, purple worm, or even dragon! They might enjoy flamewyne from the City of Brass, chocolatl from the jungles of Chult, or flavored ices created by local wizards. For folks with this kind of money, your imagination is the only limit.
I hope this article has you hungry to look at foods in your campaign. I often feel that this is a place where you can inject a bit of flavor (pun intended) to your storyline. Itâs a good way to enjoy a bit of worldbuilding that everyone can relate to.
As a side note, remember that there are folks in OUR world living in wretched circumstances. If you get a chance during the holiday season, think of them. Donate money to a good group, donate canned goods through your local grocery stores, or volunteer at a soup kitchen or food pantry. To borrow a quote from Dickens, this is a time of year when âwant is keenly felt and abundance rejoices.â Do what you can to help folks who may not be in as good a situation as you.
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