Homebrew Do people in your game world put cheese on their apple pies??

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Let me ask you something about your home brewed campaigned worlds. Do people in your world put cheese on their apple pies??

It's the primary cause of long and bloody wars.

 

[Deset Gled]

Even if apples exit, no reason to suppose they are being baked into pies. They are a cultural thing, European, and only go back around 500 years.

IMNSHO, this is one of those areas where getting too deep into details of world building sometimes breaks immersion in a game more than it helps.

Do apples exist in the fantasy world? As a DM, you can certainly try to make the world feel more fantastic by having unique fruit. So instead of an apple you could have a smerp.

Do pies exist in the fantasy world? Well, not a traditional pie; that's too normal. But most cultures have some form of a fruit baked inside of a grain. So you can invent a baked good called a findangle.

And now your party is sitting in an inn, and the proprietor offers them a smerp findangle. And you have to tell them what a smerp is. What it tastes/smells like. Answer questions. Spend game time discussing how much it's like, but totally different from, an apple. And the you describe what a findangle is. What it tastes like. Answer questions about how it's made. Have the players make a joke about the Great British Bake Off. And then, maybe, someone asks about putting cheese on it. 10 minutes later, you're back to the story.

Or, you could just say "the proprietor offers you the local version of an apple pie". And then if it's relevant, the party can discuss the details and ask questions. Or they might be more immersed in the plot, and choose to ignore the smerp findangle side discussion. Minimal focus lost, even if someone asks for cheese on top. You can even have the talk about fruit and baked goods later, if someone want to circle back to it.

 

[jayoungr]

There's a meme that goes something like this:

If you're outside the US, a Yankee is an American.
If you're inside the US, a Yankee is a northerner.
If you're in the north of the US, a Yankee is a New Englander.
If you're in New England, a Yankee lives in Vermont, New Hampshire, or Maine.
If you're in one of those states, a Yankee eats apple pie with cheddar cheese.
If you're in one of those states and you eat apple pie with cheddar cheese, a Yankee eats it for breakfast.

 

[Marc17]

Since most pies in my world are containers for the food, the cheese would normally just go inside the pie with the apples.

 

[DragonLancer]

I'm weird (apparently) because I love peanut butter and sweetcorn sandwiches. I love cheese but there is no way in the Nine Hells I'd put cheese and apple together

 

[Gothic Sunshine]

I had to answer yes, in certain regions. The core premise of my world is that it is supposed to be Eberron-style magitech, but 1970s instead of 1920s or 1930s, more invested in Fantasy Counterpart cultures, and rooted in horror comedy/b-movies/exploitation of the 60s, 70s, and 80s (sometimes 90s). Monster of the Week is a core gameflow.

This means Scooby-Doo is kind of an obvious inspiration, even though my setting is not oriented towards kids. A core flow of Scooby-Doo is driving around the United States (or, in movies, going to other countries), and doing a mystery in that particular place. At least in the later series or later movies. Thinking of how Zombie Island is Louisiana, Witches Ghost is Massachusetts, and Alien Invaders is Nevada. My setting is the same, you can hexcrawl around Fantasy Counterpart America or Britain seeing different regional cultures, and those regional cultures borrow heavily from their real world counterparts. Just like Scooby-Doo, I look at regional cuisine is a great way to set up these cultures.

Which means my setting does have a place that is essentially Fantasy Counterpart New England, and they would eat cheese on apple pie, because with a world the size of mine, it's easier to reflect the real world than write from scratch. In fact, given this is a setting based on spooky vibes and horror that has a 1970s appropriate love of the gothic, visiting Fantasy Counterpart New England isn't at all unlikely, so this may actually come up as a background detail.

 

[Mind of tempest]

Same here. I ran a cyberpunk campaign where the player characters often met at a restaurant called Sushi Train. Their signature dish was a deep fried roll smothered in country gravy. My current Greyhawk campaign has a group of monks called the Fat Boys who are dedicated to gastronomical adventures.

I don't actually like apple pie, but I've known about having a slice of cheese on them since I was a kid. I think maybe I've seen one person eat it that way my entire life.

gods that sounds disgusting and I have had non tomarto based sause for spaghetti and meat balls.