Dwarf way = bash, kill it, eat it.
Dwarf way = bash, kill it, eat it.
Fixed that for youOriginally Posted by Purplebeard
Ghouls also take out at least one of those steps.
Did a quick skim, so forgive me but my favorite Dwarf cuisine has yet to be mentioned. Taken straight from the Dwarf Background page on the GW website, found here. I have italicized the part I enjoy the most.
A few basic crops are grown within the walls of the Dwarf strongholds and hardy livestock graze on the high pastures. Good land is scarce in the mountains and Dwarfs are not great farmers, although they are enthusiastic hunters, able to find meat and fur even in the highest peaks. Grain and fruit are brought into the mountains by merchants and exchanged in the strongholds for metalwork and gold. If trade routes are cut by war, and the strongholds are besieged, the dour Dwarfs tighten their belts and dine on Dwarf stone bread, a tough bread baked from a mixture of wild grain and pulverized rock, made almost palatable when washed down with good Dwarf ale! Indeed, Dwarf ale is so nourishing that Dwarfs can survive for weeks on this alone. Every stronghold has a great store of barrels and takes immense pride in the efficacy and unique flavor of its ale.
Does it?
Since dwarf cuisine has been covered mostly, but this is still an interesting topic, lets extend it to the other races. High Elves and Dark Elves have already been discussed.
I know Skaven eat something called black corn, which is very expensive and generally reserved for those living in Skavenblight who have lots of money. It also tastes like bleep, so its probably a prestige thing. As for the rest of skaven, they eat anything and everything they can get their paws on, including members of other races and their own race! Grey Seers have a disturbing fondness of human babies, but I can't remember where I red this, still pretty sick though.
Chaos Daemons 40K 6th Edition: W = 2, L = 3, D = 0.
I could see the dwarfs eating the stereotypical Germanic foods....
From a logical standpoint...
Dwarf cuisine would be, more or less, two separate extremes. In times of plenty, fresh meat and produce would be in abundance and there would be celebratory feasts including whole-roasted animals as seen in the Malekith books. Perhaps a little plain due to the underground environment and the lack of spices found outside of trading, but nothing that would be amiss in a similar human meal. On the other hand, I can see Dwarfs making much use of preserved foods--pickles, smoked meats, sausages, canned vegetables, etc. Things that are designed to be stockpiled when available and used when needed. I can see the majority of the spices Dwarfs trade for used in the production of these preserved meats.
It is also to be noted that Dwarfs would have ready access to salt for preservation, and I would assume that salt pork (or similarly-prepared cuts of meat and fish) to be a staple of their diet. Goats and mutton, and their milk, would be a primary source of protein.
The majority of grain would be fermented to allow it to last, but bread would still be baked and likely consumed with each meal. Vegetables would either be long-lasting, like turnips and other roots, or largely canned/pickled and consumed in that manner.
On the other hand, Elves would likely consume primarily game animals, with perhaps the occasional bit of lamb or similar, and quite a lot of fish. Think French haute cuisine, but moreso. Presentation would be valued beyond all other consideration, and vegetables would be served fresh if not completely raw. I don't see grain making much of an impact in the typical Elven diet, nor tubers. Fruit would be in far higher abundance than in human or Dwarf diets, as would honey, and I can see mead standing in for wine amongst lower-class Elves.
Where diet starts to break down is amongst the so-called uncivilized races. Greenskins have their mushrooms, which apparently require some cultivation, but a race like Ogres falls into far more problematic areas. How do they manage to survive in the Mountains of Mourn on a diet of what would be considered apex predators anywhere else? Where do they find vegetation, and of what sort (notice that Ogres have the teeth of an omnivore)? And just how do you fry Elf legs in their own blood?
Heck, just to support a city like Altdorf would take thousands of square miles of farmlands, grazing areas, slaughterhouses, and so on, with lines of wagons coming and going every day, non-stop. Forget a full-frontal assault. If Archaon truly wanted to take Middenheim, all he had to do was park outside the walls and stop the wagons.
The south of the Empire contains the "breadbasket" provinces (Averland and the like). They're all rolling hill with meadows and fields.
It's worth noting that using a variety of spices in your cooking does not mean the food is "spicy".
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The 5th edition Dwarf book has a great little background tidbit on Dwarf and Elf meetings concerning food and drink, with the High King Snorri Whitebeard upon meeting the phoenix king Bel-Shanaar exchanging gifts. Bel Shanaar giving Snorri a bottle of wine so precious a single glass could bankrupt the average elf lord, which Snorri opened with his axe and then proceeding to guzzling down the entire bottle in one go ( while spilling copious amounts on his beard while being cheered on by every dwarf in sight).
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Hehe, a bunch of dwarves in heavy armour yelling "Chug! Chug! Chug!" as their king downs a whole bottle.
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I wish there was a Warhammer movie, just to make the counter to that absurd scene in the second LotR movie where Legolas outdrinks Gimli :/
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Yeah, I never quite understood that one.
There should be drunken Elves in The Hobbit though, so we'll see what Jackson makes of that.
Considering his track-record i would not be surprised if they present the elves in the hobit as being kind and just and just seven layers of chick bait.
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Just a couple of points from your message- I know what you mean by 'canned vegetables' but the concept seems kind of funnyFrom a logical standpoint...
Dwarf cuisine would be, more or less, two separate extremes. In times of plenty, fresh meat and produce would be in abundance and there would be celebratory feasts including whole-roasted animals as seen in the Malekith books. Perhaps a little plain due to the underground environment and the lack of spices found outside of trading, but nothing that would be amiss in a similar human meal. On the other hand, I can see Dwarfs making much use of preserved foods--pickles, smoked meats, sausages, canned vegetables, etc. Things that are designed to be stockpiled when available and used when needed. I can see the majority of the spices Dwarfs trade for used in the production of these preserved meats.
Where diet starts to break down is amongst the so-called uncivilized races. Greenskins have their mushrooms, which apparently require some cultivation, but a race like Ogres falls into far more problematic areas. How do they manage to survive in the Mountains of Mourn on a diet of what would be considered apex predators anywhere else? Where do they find vegetation, and of what sort (notice that Ogres have the teeth of an omnivore)? And just how do you fry Elf legs in their own blood?Get the feeling it would more likely be preserves in jars rather than canned- can't help but think of the lord of the hold cracking open a tin of Sainsbury's own sweetcorn to have with his mutton
The Ogres point is a little off base. You have to consider that Ogre's eat EVERYTHING. Since they are pretty much the only race considered as 'predators' in the Mountains of Mourn (I'm well aware that the beasts of the mountains could kill the Ogres but they don't actually go out of their way to seek them) there is absolutely no shortage of food. Pretty much all of the races that are prevalent in the Old World don't inhabit the Mountains of Mourn. There is no competition from Skaven, Man, Beastmen or Orc (in the traditional sense, they have Gnoblars as 'slaves' of course) for primary food sources. If we also consider the verdant valleys of the mountains as well as the larger animals of the higher slopes, Ogres have probably the greatest variety and quantity of food supplies in the Warhammer World, most of which is entirely kept to themselves. This would be before considering the unguarded caravans of men on the Spice Trail and unwitting invaders of other races to devour. Failing this they could just always attack and eat each other. Benefits of being the dominant species I guess.
Edit: Unguarded caravans in the sense that a tribe of Ogres would have little issue dispatching a few mercenaries. That's generally why caravans often employ Ogres themselves to safeguard their goods.
Awake O Dead, for there can be no rest for ye beneath the earth. Let the splintered bones burrow from the grave pall. Let cold fingers grip time-worn blades, and unseeing eyes survey the fields of slaughter. For your time has come once more. And the dead shall walk.
Indeed, I was referring to "canning" in the older sense, preserving vegetables in a mason jar or similar.Just a couple of points from your message- I know what you mean by 'canned vegetables' but the concept seems kind of funny
Perhaps, but the environment of the Mountains of Mourn makes very little sense whatsoever. From what we know of the Mountains of Mourn, even the "verdant valleys" are filled with predators, and even the supposed herbivores are violent, aggressive, and prone to sampling the occasional bite of meat.
Therefore, in this land of predator feeding upon predator, where are the prey species? Admittedly there's never been a series of ecological writings about the area, but every creature we know of is aggressive, at least semi-carnivorous, and highly aggressive. Add to that the voracious appetite of the Ogres and the number of individuals in a tribe and it becomes more and more obvious that they cannot self-sustain as hunter/gatherers and would need some sort of animal husbandry to survive.
Remember, we're not talking about a race that understands the importance of only taking enough to survive. We're talking about a group of people for whom eating is a religious act and whom engage in feasts where stomachs are split open due to the enormity of the foot consumed.
But, to a lesser extent, the same applies to all "evil" races. There's just no way a race of creatures like, say, Dark Elves or Beastmen could survive without their parasitic host races, and even the ones that seem to have a modicum of sustainability (say, Skaven or Greenskins) don't provide a whole lot of proof as to their viability.
This is why I like the fluff of the OK. It has some sort of basis in pre-history and parodies (loosely) the rise of the hunter-gatherer man in the late pleistocene or early 'anthropocene' era where there was very animal husbandry or farming at all. Firstly, we're not told about the entire ecology of the Mountains of Mourn- there may well be abundant prey species (although I acknowledge that they would have to reproduce rather quickly). That being said, the herbivores seem abundant enough and powerful enough to fend off the majority of predators in the region- no reason why they wouldn't find it fairly simple to survive.
We are told that Ogres do partake in some level of animal husbandry with the rhinoxen however. They are bred in captivity for the use in cooking more often than not. To be honest, I can see that OK have more viability for self-sustainability than a lot of the other races you mention. It's an interesting topic. Skaven are clever enough to devise their own food sources and they most certainly do but it sort of explains how Beastmen and Greenskins are constant migrants while DE- they seem to be an enigma all of their own.
Awake O Dead, for there can be no rest for ye beneath the earth. Let the splintered bones burrow from the grave pall. Let cold fingers grip time-worn blades, and unseeing eyes survey the fields of slaughter. For your time has come once more. And the dead shall walk.
I always assumed that the Dark Elves survive on the back of the labour of a huge number of slaves. Of course, the whole "a DE slave has a lifespan of twenty minutes" nonsense damages that proposal, but I like to think that's just hype.
Considering fluff constantly states that the entire continent is an inhospitable frozen tundra then it's a puzzling one. There would probably be the odd place available to grow a crop or two but for an entire race? That's an awful lot of reaving and pillaging required to feed every elf in Naggaroth.
Awake O Dead, for there can be no rest for ye beneath the earth. Let the splintered bones burrow from the grave pall. Let cold fingers grip time-worn blades, and unseeing eyes survey the fields of slaughter. For your time has come once more. And the dead shall walk.
The problem is that, in order to support the sheer number of alpha predators in the area, the Mountains of Mourn would have to be teeming with more than rainforest-amounts of life. Not only is there a staggering amount of predatory creatures, but there are several of considerable size. Notice that, on Earth, larger animals tend to be herbivores? There's just not enough meat to support their diet.
Creatures in the Ogre book that are known carnivores by preference, demand, or opportunity:
1: Ogres
2: Yhetees
3: Sabertusks
4: Mournfangs (note: massive size and pack hunters)
5: Rhinoxen (note: massive size, herd animals, omnivorous)
6: Fangweasels
7: Thundertusks (note: massive size)
8: Mammoths (note: massive size, herd animals, omnivorous)
9: Gnoblars (note: prey species)
The Stonehorn is kind of a strange concept because it eats stone, but is particularly aggressive.
There's just too many predators and not enough prey.
Unfortunately, Dark Elves make no sense and there's no way to make their society work. Greenskins have their mushrooms and squigs, Skaven have rats, fungi, black corn, and cannibalism, but Dark Elves need a complete rewrite if they're ever going to be believable as a society, or as a threat. The official High Elf policy regarding their twisted kin should be something like "Give them two weeks, then we'll deal with the handful of survivors."
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