D&D General Sandwiches should exist in your fantasy world!

[Shades of Eternity]

If the halflings in your setting haven't invented sandwiches, what are they even doing with their time?

The only question is what they are called.

It's multiple Choice:

1. Bready Bites - Emphasizing the bread and the small size that fits perfectly in halfling hands.
2. Hobbit Hoagies - A playful term that references their identity and their fondness for substantial, filling sandwiches.
3. Snackin’ Stackers - Highlighting how halflings love to stack various ingredients for a flavorful bite-sized treat.
4. Picnic Pockets - Suggesting that these sandwiches are perfect for enjoying during outdoor feasts and gatherings.
5. Cozy Crusts - Evoking the warmth and comfort of a well-crafted sandwich, ideal for cozy meals at home.

 

[GMMichael]

Taters, for example, PO-TAY-TOES, were an American staple cultivated in Bolivia in 8,000BCE or thereabouts. Europe wouldn't get their greedy hands on them until the early 1500s and it wouldn't become something accessible to farmers until around the 1600s.

Good post, but I don't think Middle Earth and medieval Europe shared a restauranteur's guild. Bolivia, maybe.

 

[Shades of Eternity]

Good post, but I don't think Middle Earth and medieval Europe shared a restauranteur's guild. Bolivia, maybe.

and now you know the real reason why a lot of high-magic fantasy worlds have portals

It's for takeout.

and I have proof.

 

[AlViking]

These weren't quite hamburgers though (and they were a bit....interesting in terms of flavor and texture):

A Burger Scholar makes an ancient Roman burger from 400 A.D. 😲

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Also, not quite to do with this thread, but calling hamburgers sandwiches has never felt quite right (I get they are technically sandwiches, they just feel like an odd entry in the category)

It was a bit different but it was a variation on a hamburger which makes sense since you don't exactly need a recipe for a standard burger. The real question? Is a hot dog a sandwich?

 

[Demetrios1453]

So... a TON of food we associate with "Medieval Europe" was not available in Europe in the Middle Ages.


Taters, for example, PO-TAY-TOES, were an American staple cultivated in Bolivia in 8,000BCE or thereabouts. Europe wouldn't get their greedy hands on them until the early 1500s and it wouldn't become something accessible to farmers until around the 1600s.

Frederick the Great got a hold of potatoes in Prussia, found out how EXCEPTIONAL they were at being great starchy delicious and filling foods with tons of nutrients, and tried to get the Prussians to eat potatoes. They -refused- to touch the things. So he instead hired guards to protect the potato fields but BADLY. Like so badly. People saw the potatoes being guarded and went "Oh. Those -MUST- be good! The King wants to keep them for himself! Let';s steal them!" and that's when the Prussians started eating potatoes... Shortly before the AMERICAN REVOLUTION.

Tomatoes? Same thing. Peru and Bolivia. They spread north to the Aztecs, Mayans, and Mexicans before they spread to the nations of what is now the US. Again, Europe didn't have access to them 'til the 1500s and 1600s. We associate tomatoes with Italian food, but for the majority of time the boot shaped peninsula existed there were no tomatoes there. You could get a BL but no T!

Man, that old Todd Lockwood 3e art piece with the Barfight... what a seminal piece of D&D material! Mindflayer, Beholder, Githyanki, Bugbear, Hobgoblin. Elves and Halflings and Dwarves and Gnomes. Even a Tiefling.

View attachment 393377

There are two pieces of food in this image. And they're actually the same piece of food. Turkey Legs. COME ON! How many Medieval characters have you seen in TV, movies, ren faires, chawing on a turkey leg? It's CLASSIC. It's QUINTESSENTIAL. It's the most clearly medieval thing you can do. Just hold it by the bone and tear chunks off with your teeth between swigs of ale or wine or sparkling cider at Thanksgiving while your mother looks exasperated at your terrible table manners...

And it's American. Not available in Europe until the 1500s at the earliest, Well into the Renaissance. So at least the Ren Faire got it right, more or less. Because, again, just because it -reached- Europe in the 1500s doesn't mean it was -accessible- in Europe for the vast majority of folks. It was something wealthy people might be able to get their hands on, but nobles and kings could eat a few times a year until much later when people were able to keep them alive long enough to raise them as a food animal and in large enough numbers that more people than the King could enjoy them.

TONS of what we think of as "Traditionally European" foods are actually from the Americas. And mostly from South America, if we're honest with ourselves. Remember Yondolla's Cornucopia?

Corn is from the New World. Maize, specifically, A grass seed not terribly unlike Wheat that they cultivated into many varieties of what we now call Corn. Do you have Whiskey in your setting? It's often made of Corn. Bourbon is 100% corn booze. Rum? Okay that one's Sugar Cane which originated in the South Pacific and actually reached Europe when the Muslims conquered chunks of it in the 600-1400CE range. So I -guess- we can allow Sugar Cane to be in Medieval European Fantasy without it being an anachronism...

But Rum developed in the Caribbean during the 1600s so no rum for your pirates of medieval Europe!!!

Sincerely... All of this stuff has been a part of our perception of "The Past" for so long that our fantasy games that are 'Generally Europe' include them all. Sandwiches aren't going to get you yelled at.

Tacos might. Chinese food might. But that's just because there are racist jerks who have no clue of the history of the foods they associate with Europe getting pissy about "Anachronisms" in a fantasy game where nothing makes any kind of historical sense. It's just an excuse for them to get mad about the existence of people who aren't white, cis, and straight.

View attachment 393378

And for the record: Sushi and Tacos, at least, are -actually- medieval foods of their respective cultures. Sushi was invented in the 700s as a way to preserve fish by wrapping it in cold rice, and Tacos were created at some point before 1000CE and largely served as street food or "Fast" meals since you could just HAVE tortilla sitting around ready for some vegetables and meat to get slapped into it the instant it was done cooking.

Beef Stew as we know it, today, didn't exist until the 1700s. What they had at the time was Bukkenade. A sad bowl of beef chunks floating in murky looking water thickened with egg yolks and seasoned with parsley, cloves, mace, ginger, saffron, sage, and hyssops (a type of mint). That's right. Minty Ginger Beef.

View attachment 393379

Anyone gives you guff about the foods that you have in your games, point them to this post.

Much of this - the parts detailing foods of non-European origin - really don't matter in a fantasy world, as you can move food origins around at will in your own game.

 

[Tonguez]

I think a proto-sandwich or something might fit, but a sandwich feels a little out of place in a fantasy setting for me. One of the things I like doing with fantasy settings is looking up period food and incorporating it

The steak and kidney trencher (bread loaf bowl) is real medieval food

 

[Bedrockgames]

It was a bit different but it was a variation on a hamburger which makes sense since you don't exactly need a recipe for a standard burger. The real question? Is a hot dog a sandwich?

I don't know that I would call it a variation of one, as it predates the hamburger. But I think including such an item would work for me. The issue I would have is if the GM introduced wendy's style hamburgers and pointed to the roman Isicia Omentata as a reason why, it would still feel anachronistic to me (and anachronistic can be fine in the right campaign, but generally hamburgers and ice cream cones showing up in my fantasy campaign are going to feel a little off to me)

 

[Shades of Eternity]

It was a bit different but it was a variation on a hamburger which makes sense since you don't exactly need a recipe for a standard burger. The real question? Is a hot dog a sandwich?

The answer is determined by the cross-comparison: is a Polish sausage in a bun a sandwich as well?

 

[Bedrockgames]

The steak and kidney trencher (bread loaf bowl) is real medieval food

Sure but they were using stale bread as a surface to eat on then fed them to the dogs. I mean I am not saying other people can't have hamburgers if they want. I just wouldn't find the existence of a trencher would make a sesame seed bun modern style hamburger make sense to me in a typical fantasy campaign (in a gonzo campaign my reaction would be different)

 

[Steampunkette]

agree with all, but with technology of D&D, I would say it's mostly 1600s and early 1700s, but the gunpowder is lagging by about 200+ years and it's just starting to enter "D&D technology"

so D&D is alternate timeline 1700s Europe without gunpowder or very little of it.

because gunpowder is lame and it's hard to do knightly fantasy when bomb and cannon balls are ruining your castles every day.

Eh...

D&D isn't an "Alternate Timeline" of Europe. It's a bunch of fantasy realms most of which rely on various bits and pieces of historical equipment, food, monsters, and mannerisms cherry picked from 7000BCE to 1800CE based on what the people writing it think is cool or interesting.

It being "European" is an entirely external perspective that takes all the quasi-historical bits to declare it to be so while ignoring the MASSIVE quantity of stuff that isn't remotely European. Even the things we THINK are European.

Take Crossbows, for example. They were so powerful, popular, and devastating in battle that the Pope banned their use in warfare in 1139CE. But they were invented in China around 500BCE and only reached Europe via the Silk Road some time around 200BCE. Sure the Greeks had Ballista by that point, but nothing hand-held.

There's Mummies and Sphinxes and Jackalweres from Egypt. Couatl are Mesoamerican. Zombies from Haiti. Gryphons originate not in Rome but in Babylon/Iran alongside Djinni, Ghouls, Manticors, and Rocs. Oni, Kenku, Dragon Turtles, Japan and China. Rakshasa, Devas, Nagas, and Yetis all come from India and other cultures they touched in Southeast Asia based on Hindu and Buddhist myths.

There's -tons- of stuff in D&D that is just a grab bag of stuff created by non-European cultures and well outside the "1700s".

Add in all the food stuff...

It's not Europe. Alternate Timeline or otherwise.

Good post, but I don't think Middle Earth and medieval Europe shared a restauranteur's guild. Bolivia, maybe.

Very possibly! That, or Tolkien was so invested in the invention of languages and mythology he didn't consider the origin of foodstuffs and just kinda wrote about delicious foods he liked or knew existed when he wrote about the Hobbits and their feasts 'cause it wasn't that important. Tea, for example, which started up in China and didn't really spread to England until after the conquest of India. Sometime in the 1650s.

Either way!

Much of this - the parts detailing foods of non-European origin - really don't matter in a fantasy world, as you can move food origins around at will in your own game.

... yes that's the entire point of the post.

That it doesn't matter what foods you include in a fantasy setting, sandwiches or otherwise, because it's only based on revisionist perspectives of history and fantasy that establish what is "Accurate" or not.