NOVEL FROG Chapter 688 – Underground Bounties
“It takes a certain genius to eke out a living in the dark underground, much less to build what might well be called an Empire down there.” - Saying attributed to the Silver Maiden.
As the night grew deeper and a good chunk of the tavern’s patrons left or drank themselves to sleep, the proprietor started bringing out several dishes of food for those who were still up and drinking, as he had been in the business too long to not be aware of what his customers likely wanted. Some good food to accompany a late night drinking session was welcomed by everyone still awake at the time.
Unlike the other dwarven nations, due to the location of the Kingdom Down Under’s caverns, which were much deeper below the ground, their main source of staple foods were naturally also flora and fauna that could be found within the underground world. Sure, there were imports from the topside, where corn, soybeans, and wheat were grown in large quantities, but there were more people living underground than what the topside could ever hope to feed.
As such, the main staple food of the underground dwarves was instead an odd sort of palm-like flora that grew, flower, and bore fruit in the underground environment. The fruits were a source of edible cooking oils that were relatively easy to extract, while the main stalk of the crop itself was a source of starches for the underground people.
They would wring and crush the stalks of the palm and extract every bit of juice and softer pulp within, leaving behind only the inedible, tough fibers. Those fibers were often set aside, allowed to dry, then woven into cloth and other things as needed. As for the extracted pulp and juice, it would be strained, separating the murky, slightly sweet juice from the crushed pulp.
Where the plant’s juice would then be used for cooking or making beverages – it was edible without need of processing even for humans, with a slightly sweet-sour taste – the pulp was instead left to dry. Once it had dried properly it would then be ground and sifted to create a fine flour, a process that was typically repeated twice or thrice to ensure that no lumps remained in the flour.
That flour would then be used to make various staple foods of Göttmøræghthœthangmär, as the dwarven locals of the Kingdom Down Under called the place.
One such staple was a dense, dough-like ball that was made by cooking some of the resultant flour with the juices extracted from the same plant until they formed a thick paste that was then shaped into balls. The doughy balls were eaten with strongly flavored stews, where the diner would rip off a chunk with their fingers, form a small cup-like shape out of the piece they ripped off, and then grab the stew with it.
The stew itself had more of the typical ingredients commonly formed underground, like several kinds of mushrooms and meat from large, worm-like creatures that the dwarves raised in captivity for their flesh. The worm meat tasted almost like smoked pork after it was cooked, as it was quite salty and had a lot of fat, probably due to their mineral-rich diet.
Why such creatures were raised by the dwarves was actually an example of killing two birds with one stone. The worm-like creatures were known to dig through dwarven tunnels when they grow large – some of the side tunnels Aideen’s group saw on the way was the handiwork of particularly large specimens of the creatures – so keeping them contained was to the benefit of the dwarves. Since the creatures had good meat, though, the dwarves naturally did not just exterminate them and instead raised them for their meat.
Supposedly such creatures were more plentiful in the underground in the early eras of the dwarven Kingdom Down Under, where they menaced the dwarves as they in turn tried to expand. In the present date, only an approximated thousand or so wild specimens remained in the wild, most of them large, ancient ones that had learned to avoid the dwarven tunnels.
Any large worm that strayed too close to dwarven territory and was found would be hunted down and killed with extreme prejudice.
It was a bit cruel, but Aideen also understood why the dwarves did so. The worms were to the tunnels like termites to a wooden building. While the ones they raised in captivity were contained and would not harm their home, the wild ones posed a constant risk of doing so.
Perhaps because it was made with the juices of the plant as well, the doughy paste had a faint sweet-sourness to it that gave a pleasant backdrop to the stronger flavors of the stew. The stew itself was earthy from the many mushrooms it contained and savory from the chunks of worm meat it had. Since the meat was rich in fat, part of that fat had also seeped out into the stew proper and lent its richness to the whole flavor profile.
Other than moles, certain rodents, and a few other creatures, most of the dwellers of the deep underground were some sort of insect. As such, they naturally also formed a large part of the local dwarven diet. Flatbreads made by frying flour over hot skillets were filled with chopped mushrooms and ant eggs, which were apparently a local delicacy. The ant eggs had a nutty flavor that complemented the earthy mushrooms well.
Another common local drinking snack was the flesh of a giant centipede – and it was no exaggeration to call it giant as it was nearly as thick around as an adult human’s wrist – that had been steamed, shelled, and then plunged into a bowl filled with vinegar made from the juice of the palm, oil, salt, and spicy dried chili flakes.
The chilies were a sort that grew underground and had an odd, pale whitish color, but were amongst the spiciest Aideen had ever tasted. The flesh of the centipede itself tasted and had a texture similar to shrimp or prawn meat, just served in larger chunks. The sour, salty, and spicy flavor from the “sauce” it was served with meshed well with the natural sweetness of the meat and made for a very pleasant – if strong tasting – snack.
Just the sort of thing to enjoy with a strong mug of ale, in other words.
