Flight Rising Discussion

Ok so since there are multiple food items whose captions imply dragons are capable of cooking/food preparation... [item=water shield][item=cindermint][item=vegetable oil][item=yellowtail caterpillar] ...(like these ones for example), and every Flight supposedly has its own culture, [b]what kinds of regional dishes do y'all think different Flights would have??[/b] For Plague I had an idea for a dish called "Hunter's Pride" which would always consist of seafood, insects, bird meat, and meat from a landbound animal (rabbit, lizard, whatever) And for Earth I thought of something called "Gems of the Earth" which could feature particularly shiny-shelled beetles? For Wind I was thinking Bamboo Shoot Soup, because I mean. Have you [i]seen[/i] the Windswept Plateau So yeah feel free to throw in new ideas, or just tell me what you think about these three dishes. I'm not exactly a culinary expert irl so I'd love to hear opinions

Ice cooking (except for what Tundras eat) resembles traditional Inuit food- lots of fish and meat from marine mammals. They also eat horrifying fermented fish dishes like people in Scandinavia.

Light dragons put olive oil on absolutely everything.

Arcane flight has a tradition of weird culinary experimentation - think molecular gastronomy.

Earth eat a lot of root vegetables - boil 'em, mash 'em, stick 'em in a stew.

I love worldbuilding stuff like this! Thinking about the food made by different cultures and the reasons why is very fun for me.

I think that Nature Flight probably has mostly raw food, although what it is varies. Near the borders, there's more varied food from other Flights, but in more traditional circles, it's either arrangements of sliced-up raw food if you want to be fancy or just straight-up whole plants and carcasses for less "civilized" clans.

In contrast, Plague has mastered the art of fermentation, knowing exactly which types of bacteria and fungi produce which results. Because of the desperation which is common in the Wasteland, Plague dragons will also often eat raw food, but even this is often fermented in some way because of the territory being so thick with microorganisms and fungi.

Light definitely has Mediterranean food, and is the most into fancy food out of any of the Flights.

[quote name="SiltWolf" date="2022-12-05 11:46:53" ] [item=Cinnamon] [item=Brussels Sprouts] The warming, comforting effect of cinnamon and its availability be gathered in Ice territory makes me think the bark could be used often in Ice flight dishes. I imagine they would use it in both sweet and spicy, savoury dishes. Most recipes call for at least a sprinkle of cinnamon. [/quote] i do this too! on top of lattes, popcorn, in chili, makes any comfort food better. except i live in the devil's armpit aka florida and it's always too hot for this stuff [emoji=tundra sad size=1] water flight has no fire to cook with but thats not a problem, the seafood is so fresh and perfect that you eat it all raw or maybe boiled if you can find a nice hydrothermal vent. salt tends to kill fruit trees though (ik what the world map says and yeah uhuh sure sharks and rays and coral live in freshwater suuuuuure.), so i imagine they get a lot of blackberries imported from shadow and potash peaches from fire

To consider what they eat, I feel like you gotta consider what the Flight society is like and who their primary breeds are - though breeds is more of a loose guideline, because many different types of dragon will inhabit a Flight, but the ones who sorta 'settled' it will have a lot of influence on the old traditions including with food.

Ice, for example, has a mostly herbivorous population of Tundra. They are hardy travellers who live in big social groups, practice grazing similar to most herbivorous animals, have very tough stomachs, and rely highly on their very sensitive sense of smell. They're essentially cows with human-level intelligence. It'd be safe to assume that they don't actually do a lot of cooking and are fine eating raw, foraged foods as they find them. They're a big fan of salads, those ones.
But if they were to cook, somewhere so cold and desolate probably has a lot of focus on trying to make food last as long as possible. It's a lot of preserves, slow-cooked stews and soups, fermentation, pickling, those sorts of things. I imagine they try to keep it not too smelly too, since it'll bother the poor Tundra's sensitive noses.
Gaolers are likely quite similar since they're so very focused on their work and not on things like cooking.
Stews and soups are definitely very popular I think, though, because both groups value community - any sane dragon in the Southern Icefield travels with a group - and those are very communal dishes, in my head.

I could probably think of more and may edit as I do.

Whenever I do the mistjam cooking contest I like to try to include plague elements in my dishes. Usually, I like to include poisonous creatures because, they're edible and in the game, someone's gotta be able to eat them, and who else would try it if not plague? Just because you will eat literally whatever you can find, doesn't mean you don't also want some flavor. I think using mold, lichen, and mushrooms would be common, since herbs/plants don't grow there.

Another idea is that plague hunters will pile all their food into a big perpetual stew sort of thing at the center of town, with like a bone broth bc we got so many bones laying around. That way, there's always something to eat and nothing goes to waste.

I keep all my recipes on this dragon, but some are better than others lol. I like using the super weird in game items, that you have to use your imagination on what it might taste like

I've also seen people in other threads like this suggest that plague dragons would be making bread and cheese and stuff, because bacteria, which is a cool idea.

[quote name="corndog" date="2022-12-05 11:46:53" ] water flight has no fire to cook with but thats not a problem, the seafood is so fresh and perfect that you eat it all raw or maybe boiled if you can find a nice hydrothermal vent. salt tends to kill fruit trees though (ik what the world map says and yeah uhuh sure sharks and rays and coral live in freshwater suuuuuure.), so i imagine they get a lot of blackberries imported from shadow and potash peaches from fire [/quote] "sharks and rays and coral live in freshwater suuuuuure" either it's magic or they're not the same as our versions of them, next question

water and wind would probably have some killer sushi. this probably doesn't need much explanation but i'd be glad to.

1. rice. requires freshwater marshes and wind has singer's brook. additionally, the rivers dividing most flight territories would likely be freshwater or brackish but not too bad for rice growth.
2. kelp. they call it the kelp beds because theres kelp and dragons and maren alike harvest kelp.
3. fish. salmon are like "water is water!" famously, and they'd probably run up the many streams from the great body of water around sornieth and the sea of a thousand currents. water dragons are already adept at catching other fish, eg trout, so they could just grind over at the mouths of the rivers and catch so much salmon and export it.

additionally, considering again that wind and water border, and that wind has a lot of asian-inspired fauna and architecture, sushi seems like a natural conclusion. guardians and undertides would go crazy for it. Thank you for coming to my ted talk.

Adding onto Wind, I like to imagine that many dishes have bugs in them because of Spiral dragons' diets! Bamboo Shoot Soup combined with cooked Bean Beetle.. it would be the few times one wouldn't mind having a fly in their soup!