What Kings Ate and Wizards Drank

Dedication

To my teachers and professors who instilled in me a lifelong love of history

Acknowledgements

A work of this scope is not possible without the help and support of large groups of people. First, a thank you to Tina Moreau of Tyche Books for requesting this project. Second, Margaret Curelas for putting up with my erratic writing behaviour and not once calling me up in the middle of the night screaming, I know you are only half done and there’s only a month left. What are you doing on Facebook?? If our roles were reversed, I would not have exercised such restraint.

A big thank you to Charles Perry and his publisher, Prospect Books, for allowing me to use a number of their translations. Another big thank you goes out to Anniina Jokinen, who runs www.luminarium.org, giving scholars and laypeople alike free access to endless historical information. I’d like to thank EPL’s Lois Hole Library who, at one point, had an entire cart dedicated to my interlibrary loans. I also want to thank all of the artists who had to draw pudding bags and pateras, and had to ask me what on earth those things were, just so that I could even begin to convey my artistic needs to my editors.

My writing groups (S&R and Writers Cubed) put up with lots of questions, brainstorming, and beta reading. A special thanks must go out to Debora Geary, Phoenix Sullivan, Gillian Grey, Rebecca M. Senese, G. Clarke, and Sara Reine, who put up with my 1 a.m. sobbing emails mid-book when I was convinced that I should burn the entire manuscript and become a nun. These women deserve medals for what I put them through.

As usual, my poor stepkids need mentioning. Michael and Jacob always get yelled at a lot in the days immediately before and after the hand-in date. As soon as I find where I hid your iPods, I promise I’ll give them back.

Finally, this book would not have been possible without Peter’s unwavering support. If she were alive today, Jane Austen would have turned you into a hero.

"The pleasures of this world are divided into six classes. They are food, drink, clothing, sex, scent, and sound. The most eminent and perfect of these is food; for food is the foundation of the body and the material of life.(i)"

Muhammad b. al-Hasan b. Muhammad b. al-Karim, the scribe of Baghdad, 13th century

Introduction

It was early 2011 and I was neck-deep in writing the second book of my epic fantasy series when Tina Moreau called me up. The literary scene in Alberta is pretty small and tight, and we’d gotten to know each other around the fandom conventions in Edmonton and Calgary over the years. We’d also worked together in publishing before, so a call from her wasn’t that out of the ordinary.

The conversation, however, went differently than our usual ones. She, along with Margaret Curelas, had finally taken the plunge and set up their publishing house, Tyche Books. Great, I said. Is there anything I can help with?

Famous last words. You'd think I'd have learned my lesson by now!

Tina was waiting for that question and casually mentioned that I should write a proposal for a fantasy writer’s guide about food. Oh my. I'd been threatening to write something along those lines for quite a while, but never got up the courage. Who would want a book by little ol' me? I am an amateur. I don't have twenty years’ experience and three Ph.D.s and a wing of a library named after me. I only have a bachelor's degree in history. I only read period recipe books and recreate the meals. What do I know? The doubt ferrets waged a heavy war. I ran my ideas by some writer friends of mine, who threatened to tie me to a chair if I did not submit a proposal. So, I wrote out an outline and the rest is history.

Water and basic foods are necessary to our survival. We don’t need elaborate cakes, cookies, and meat pies to live. Yet, every culture throughout history has developed different local tastes and preferences that eventually developed into regional and cultural identities. Ask a dozen people about their family's traditional winter Solstice meal and you'll get a dozen different answers. Extend the question to any period in history, and the range becomes even broader and more exotic.

Food is much more than just mere survival; it is an extension of who we are.

It is this history and culture surrounding food that has always fascinated me. Bread riots, starving soldiers, Corn Laws: all of this tells us so much about what it means to be human. Whip a man and he’ll continue to obey your orders. Stop feeding him and he’ll desert to the enemy. Don’t pay the peasants and they’ll grumble; tax their grain and they’ll storm the castle.

Food is power.

My educational background taught me that point on an intellectual level. Yet, I never quite grasped the humanity involved in the why of those events. Why did peasants revolt over the price of bread, when they were being strung up for poaching a grouse? Why on earth would a halfpenny increase in grain cause peasants to storm the gates? I could not wrap my early-twenties brain around those ideas.

It took working with Edmonton’s homeless population many years later for me to understand the power of food. I ran The Mustard Seed—Edmonton's evening meal program and was interviewed fairly often as part of that role, and the intercity committees that I belonged to. It was at one of these interviews by a local newspaper that it hit me. I was asked what I’d learned from being in the role. I’d not been asked that question before, and it took me a moment to gather my thoughts. What had I learned? Apparently, everything my professors had tried to teach me:

"Food is power—and it can be used sometimes as a weapon. Foods that are healthy are often more expensive ... [Affordable food] is often processed food—potato chips, French fries—that have no nutritional value. At no point do we, as a society, teach these people, who are the most vulnerable, how to eat healthy. So they just buy what's most affordable. I've learned how much society uses food as a way to divide people by who can afford, and who cannot.(ii)"

Food is a basic need and, with basic needs, come power and powerlessness. Day after day, I witnessed a charity mindset that had not changed much in a thousand years. Attitudes and preconceptions regarding the poor often remained stuck in Queen Elizabeth I’s time, when table scraps, suspect food, and nutritionally-void foods were given to the poor.

I don’t mean to say that these donations were not appreciated; of course they were. Anything given out of the goodness of someone’s heart was graciously accepted and received. However, I admit that some days I felt like I’d been transported back to the early Christian church days, where fasting monks dropped their untouched dinner into baskets for distribution to the poor.

I learned how food could be used as a weapon and how society uses food as a means of dividing those who can afford to eat well and those who cannot. I learned how I could bring people together and pull people apart using nothing more than a plate of food. I finally understood why those peasants rioted.

Yet, it’s rare to see food riots in fantasy novels! Worlds with distinct caste lines drawn along income lines do not seem to also draw the lines along food. Not enough of our farmer-turned-hero protagonists have the threat of a hanging whenever they kill a deer for an evening supper.

What Kings Ate aims to change all that.

There was a fair bit of confusion in the early days when I announced this book. Many people thought I was writing an historical cookbook. Still others thought I was writing a variation of the popular official and unofficial guides to fantasy books. While writing a historical cookbook or a Cooking with Elves: An Ogre’s Guide would be a blast, that was never the main intent of What Kings Ate. At its heart, this is a writer’s guide. It just happens to also be a comedy and a historical cookbook. Three for the price of one, if you will.

Whether you are dragging your rag-tag rebellion through enemy territory or wining and dining cutthroat rivals, eventually you will need to feed these people. I hope to present you, the author and creator of your own universe, tools to consider when looking at troop movements, adding conflict, adding drama, and adding realism into your work.

Does that mean only fantasy writers can enjoy this book? Not at all. In fact, I think anyone who loves old recipes and history can find a lot to enjoy in this book.

I will be focusing on historical fantasy and epic fantasy. Fantasy is vast and varied, and a large component of it is set in a quasi-medieval Europe (often Britain) or set in a recognizable historical or alternative historical setting. However, just because I will be focusing on fantasy authors doesn't mean this guide won't be helpful to writers in other genres.

Steampunk, set in the alternative Victorian era of wheels and cogs, invention and steam, has historical components that will challenge many a writer who aims for a very realistic flair. In discussions concerning this book, many writers have admitted to me about being clueless on topics such as how to feed their airship crew in the age of coal, or how ice arrived in downtown London in August. So, sometimes airships and steam trains are going to sneak onto these pages.

Likewise, those who write either historical novels or historical romances might need the occasional starting point or a general overview to help with getting one's troops into a siege position, or for organizing a feast where the hero falls in love with the heroine. Many of the concepts discussed in this book can be used either directly or indirectly to help steer your research and fuel your creativity.

However, I didn’t want to forget all of the fantasy readers out there. You are wonderfully loyal and supportive. You own every single Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms book. You love Tolkien and Brooks, Jordan and Sanderson. Perhaps you even Live Action Role Play (LARP) or enjoy a game of Dungeons & Dragons on your weekends. Perhaps you love the works of Jack Whyte and Bernard Cromwell and want to know more about pickled tongue.

Or, maybe you are just the curious sort. You love fiction, and also learning about new things. You’re interested in learning how people ate before refrigerators and transport trucks. You’ll find lots to enjoy here—and a number of recipes to scare your kids.

This book’s entire purpose is to make novels more enjoyable for readers out there, who are tired of reading books where the heroes bake tea biscuits in the forest, or where chocolate-dipped beef jerky protein bars were passed around at the Battle of Hastings (I’m not even making that up).

Readers are my lifeblood. So I’ve aimed to make this book as fun for you as (I hope) it will be informative for writers.

Why the Focus on Fantasy Writers?

I’ve had a love affair with fiction for a very long time, but I also love the entire process of writing and publishing. On top of my fiction writing, I’ve also worked as a slush reader for a micro Canadian publisher, and served as a fiction magazine intern. I’ve read and critiqued hundreds of new writers for science fiction and fantasy, helping them with their manuscripts. I get a number of emails asking for technical help with historical facts. One of the biggest issues I’ve seen while doing these tasks is the complete and utter lack of knowledge about the most basic of human needs: food.

I’ve read stories where armies successfully forage for food in metre-deep snow. Adventuring parties manage to stalk, kill, gut, and stew a deer in less than an hour. Or, the hero pulls out glass jars of tomato paste, ketchups, and sauces, even though he’s carrying everything in a backpack. Or, heroines baking leavened bread in elaborate stone ovens while staying in dirt-floor huts.

When I first mentioned that I was writing this book, the response was overwhelming. It actually surprised me how many writers and readers alike were frustrated by these same tales! I was bombarded with hilarious quotes from readers and very frustrated authors who wanted to get things right but couldn’t boil an egg without burning it. So, after much brainstorming and thought, I decided that the best thing I could do was to create a basic guide, a getting-started-with-food handbook, if you will.

I address the basics of common food challenges in fantasy. Travelling in foreign lands (with or without your legion) is difficult to manage for many writers, so significant space is devoted to this challenging aspect of getting your heroine from Point A to Point B without dying of starvation or conjuring up a McDonald’s.

We will dive into the unique challenges of your world, including the availability of food (there is a reason lamb isn’t served at Christmas) and how it might be sold, delivered, and preserved.

No fantasy guide would be complete without a chapter on medicinal beverages and alcoholic tonics for our thirsty wizards. Also, I will address the social division of food between the very poor and the royal courts. And finally, I will present some recipes and meal ideas to help your heroine keep her army fed while she invades the North Country.

This book will have a Northern Hemisphere bias, and will feature a Medieval Britain prejudice. The fact remains that a significant amount of the epic fantasy novels are still based on these locations and time periods, so I felt it was important to dedicate priority to them.

However, I also firmly believe that the fantasy genre could use some new life and focus. In supporting that belief, I will also be including examples from different cultures, time periods, and countries. Just because cast iron was used in Britain does not mean cast iron needs to be used in YOUR epic fantasy!

So, shall we dig into some cabbage pottage?

Chapter 1. On the Road Again:

Keeping Your Party Well Fed On the Road

"Slit a chicken's throat, and skin it after inflating(i)"

On the whole, modern life is good to us. If I get the munchies on the way home from work, I can stop at one of a dozen fast food drive-thrus, grab a latte, or even hit a vending machine filled with a variety of snacks, some of which might be actual food.

Things are a little different when you are walking (or running) in a pre-refrigeration era, or, if very lucky, travelling on the back of a beast or in a carriage. You will need to carry food with you or have places to stop and stock up. If not, you will probably starve to death long before you can rescue the prince and save the kingdom from doom. And that would be bad.

Do you remember those old video games where your character is carrying two hundred pounds of items in a backpack, including a ladder and fifty feet of rope? Traditional fantasy can sometimes read like those old video games; the heroes have unlimited food and drink conjuring bags.

Hungry? Poof! A dead rabbit appears in your pot, entrails and fur already removed.

Thirsty? Poof! A lake of safe water appears just around the bend.

If your characters are moving across vast distances, sooner or later you will need to address food and water. Running away from rampaging orc hordes takes a lot of calories.

Are your intrepid heroes sauntering down a well-travelled toll road where there is a village every ten kilometres? That’s an easy distance to cover, so there will be plenty of opportunity to eat. Or, are your adventurers travelling through a rough trail in a sparsely-populated area? Are they slogging through the forest, hacking a path through the underbrush as they go? Any of these situations will greatly impact your hero's ability to perform the tasks ahead.

While reading this book, consider these questions. How will your hero carry his drinking water? What will your heroine be eating? What is your adventuring party’s experience in the terrain they are exploring? Do they have any outdoor experience, as a farmer will have different knowledge from a soldier, and different again from a pampered aristocrat. Are your heroes legally allowed on the land they are occupying? With those questions in our minds, let’s hit the trails.

Backpacking through the Wilderness

Walking long distances works up an appetite. I’m a casual backpacker. I don’t get to scramble the peaks like I used to, but I try to squeeze in a couple weekend jaunts into the backcountry every year. Ultra-light weight has been the theme of hiking in the last decade. Modern technology allows us to reduce the weight of what we carry. It’s about time, too. My joints aren’t as young as they used to be.

No matter how much lightweight titanium equipment I own, it sadly still weighs something and that weight adds up, adding stress and demand on a person’s body. For a four day hike in Jasper National Park in September, I typically carry:

Hiking boots and a pair of flip-flops

Poles

Pack

Tent, sleeping bag, self-inflating sleeping pad, pillow

1 change of clothing, plus a face cloth, dish towel, extra underwear and socks, a sweater, PJ bottoms

Rain gear

Food, stove, fuel, cooking utensils

Water bladder, water filtration system, emergency water filtration pills

First Aid kit, compass, map, altimeter, emergency chocolate supply

That comes out to be about 27 pounds when I step on the scale fully decked out. The most I’ve hiked with was around 50 pounds, but I was carrying a field radio from the Korean War that was the size of a space shuttle. I've seen some people get down to 18 pounds, and others as high as 40 pounds. Put into perspective, a Roman soldier, who missed out on the ultra-lightweight rage, marched carrying sixty pounds of gear. Every day. For years.(ii)

How does all of that weight and exercise impact the hero’s body? The most obvious effect is that with more weight comes a slower pace and the more tired he’ll become. It’s not easy to carry the gear, protect yourself from the elements, and have enough food to keep your morale and energy high, all the while ensuring you can physically keep up the pace without exhaustion setting in because you’re carrying a kitchen sink on your back.

That added weight combined with the exercise greatly impacts one’s nutritional needs. This is bad news when we need our hero to be in full strength to arrive at the castle to challenge his evil brother for control of the kingdom.

Over the years, I’ve had to filter water and share my snacks with people on the trails because they had no concept of what walking in the woods or up a mountain is actually like. These were always marked to semi-marked trails, too, where paths were already worn into the forest. Imagine cutting through brush as many heroes end up doing. They’d drop from exhaustion within days without proper food and water.

Calorie estimates for women usually fall in the 1800-2000 calories a day, with men in the 2300-2500 range. That's for the average person, doing everyday things like working in an office and exercising a couple times a week. 2000 calories looks