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DF Suggestions / Cooking and Brewing Diversity: the Food and Drink Megathread

« on: October 31, 2010, 01:46:15 am »

Last Updated Jul. 30th, 2011.

This is an attempt to record all brewing and cooking suggestions from all over the forum in one place and unify them into a cohesive whole. It is a brainstorming thread about all brewing and cooking related items, features and events. Please feel free to contribute your ideas, point out flaws, or provide useful images, links or source materials.

If you have an idea more related to the things in rivers, oceans or overall water diversity, feel free to post it here.
If you have an idea more related to creatures or features above ground, feel free to post it here.
If you have an idea more related to the Dwarf Fortress interface, post it here.

This is not a discussion about game mechanics, balance issues, bugs or anything else not related to cooking or brewing.

I will try to fit as many of the ideas together into a workable whole as possible, but some of these ideas might conflict with one another.

UNDER NO CONDITION is this thread meant to be the end all, be all absolute PROPER place to post a food or cooking related suggestion. DO NOT berate others for not posting here. Instead invite them here, or link their suggestion into this thread.

General Suggestions:
Miscellaneous things that do not fit into another category, this section is also the catch-all for new ideas.

Cook and Brewer Save Usable Items - It would be nice if there was a way to have the kitchen to preserve seeds, bones, and shells if desired. This is especially important now that shells are so difficult to come by.
Cave Lobster Gives a Shell - I know this can be modded in, but given how difficult it is to get shells, this should be the default.
Kitchens Designated as a Zone - Make kitchens designated as a zone, like the hospital, that can have various useful apparatus added to them (stove for cooking, counter space for preparation, oven for bread, and the like).
Campfire - Cooks could make a campfire to prepare food before a kitchen has been designated. In adventure mode, players should be able to build a campfire as their primary means to cook meals.
Kitchen Tools - If individual tools are ever incorporated into Dwarf Fortress, the kitchen, and food making in general, will need numerous items (pots, pans, spits, knives, spoons, etc).

More Authentic Cooking and Brewing:
These suggestions are geared towards making the cooking and brewing process a better simulation of how they work in the real world.

Cooking Requires Fuel - Cooking hot meals should require wood or some other fuel. Foods prepared cold would be possible but would be of lower quality (less desirable).
Brewing Requires Water - Brewing should require water.
Separate Task For Destilling - Distilling alcohols should be a separate step available in the Brewery/Still workshop. This would turn simple alcohols into more potent, more valuable alcohols. For instance, dwarven wine is distilled into dwarvish brandy, dwarven beer or ale distilled into dwarven whiskey, sunshine distilled into elvish cordial, etc. Brewed drinks could be turned into spirits/hard liquors at a ratio of say three barrels of the former to one barrel of the latter, or perhaps it could be player selectable from two to four barrels to allow the player to choose the strength(proof) of the final product. Some spirits/hard liquors could be used for medical sterilization, if they are high enough proof.
Fermentation - Simulate fermentation more realistically by making it take longer. This could be implemented by using the aging suggestion and requiring that brews be aged a certain amount in their barrels before they are drinkable.
Flavors - Flavor tags give flavor scores to items: salty, sweet, sour, bitter, spicy, savory; which are used to determine the final outcome of the dish.
Nutritional Value - Ingredients could have differing nutritional values, which can then be summarized when they are combined.
Millable Ingredients - Seeds and other food ingredients should be millable. This would generally result in a powder and a liquid. One of these would have to be categorized as a spice, so as not to produce a magical extra unit of food. A rock nut might produce rock nut flour [ingredient] and rock nut oil [spice]. A strawberry might produce strawberry juice [ingredient], and stawberry garnish [spice]. A fish could produce shredded fish meat [ingredient] and fish oil [spice].
Cookable Salt Chunks - Salt chunk body parts from forgotten beasts made of salt should be cookable. There should be some advantages to using it instead of regular salt. (Sky high value?)

Ingredient Based Cooking
Cooking by Combining Ingredients is one of the most commonly suggested cooking changes. The following suggestions are all related to how ingredient based cooking would work. Example spreadsheet.

Main Ingredient - The primary ingredient of the dish. Only one main ingredient may be present in a dish and it must not be a liquid.
Base Ingredient - This ingredient drives the type of dish. Flour produces pies, alcohol produces stews, intestines produces sausages, etc.
Secondary Ingredients - Additional ingredients, similar to the main ingredient, used in fancier dishes. Liquid ingredients are allowed.
Spices - Used for flavoring. Fancier dishes would receive more spices. Spices do not add to the size of the final meal.
Ingredient Preparations - Ingredients can be prepared to include in a meal in many ways: minced, sliced, diced, cubed, julienned, mashed, ground, grated, tenderized, chopped, breaded, plain.
Hot Cooking Methods - Baked, Cooked, Broiled, Grilled, Roasted, Seared, Toasted, Caramelized, Cured, Smoked, Browned, Sautéed.
Cold Cooking Methods - Chilled, Raw.
Hot Liquid Cooking Methods - Blanched in, Boiled in, Braised in, Parboiled in, Poached in, Simmered in, Steamed in, Steeped in, Stewed in, Glazed in. Hot liquid cooking could result in less total food units produced in some cases, as a result of evaporation and other waste.
Cold Liquid Cooking Methods - Pickled in, Marinated in.
Spice Cooking Methods - These are special cooking methods that use oils, which are considered spices. Fried, Deep fried, Stir fried.
Spicing - Garnished with, Spiced with, Seasoned with, Topped with, Flavored with, Coated with, Stuffed with, Rubbed with.
Disallow or Restrict Duplicate Ingredients - Prevent a dish from being made up of only one single ingredient.
Mixed and Hot Drinks - Dwarves should be able to make different flavored drinks in the kitchen, either by combining multiple types of alcohol or by combining other ingredients with alcohol or water. Cold preparation would be a mixed drink, hot preparation would result in a hot drink.

More Food/Drink/Ingredient Types
New ingredients would be anything that already exists or should logically exist within the game that cannot currently be cooked and/or brewed but should be allowed to be integrated into booze or meals.

Blood - Dwarves should be able to use blood as an ingredient when cooking. Very dwarfy!
Bread - Seriously, flour is strange with no bread.
Extracts - Venom, golden salve, etc. Existing extracts like milk, plant oils, and honey (for Mead!) should be also be usable ingredients for a variety of meals.
Juices - Made from squashing/milling plants, as noted in Millable Ingredients above. Juices should be both drinkable as is and usable as ingredients in other food and drink.
Processed items - Quarry bush leaves, flour, dwarven syrup, dwarven sugar, butter, etc.
Spices - Salt, pepper, and more dwarfy spices (whatever those are).
Fruit Trees - Fruit bearing trees to increase the diversity of extracts and alcohols.
Vinegar - The next stage of alcohol fermentation. This would be a useful product for pickling, cooking, cleaning, as well as other reactions (perhaps at the alchemists workshop).
Ice - If a fortress has access to ice, it should be able to use that to prepare various iced treats, like ice cream, and chopped/crushed ice mixed with food or drink ingredients.

Storage and Preservation
Modifying how food is preserved and stored by adding increased spoilage and means to preserve ingredients to prevent it.

Increased Food Spoilage - Even in barrels, some types of food ingredients should spoil. These would include raw meat, organs, fruit, vegetables, mushrooms, milk, bread. All ingredients should last long enough to give the player ample chance to use them before they rot, perhaps an entire season when stored underground since caves tend to be naturally cool.
Icebox\Icehouse - Food stored near ice, or in a sufficiently cold location that it would freeze should not spoil. In frozen biomes, food could be left outside. Enough ice stored together (especially underground) should stay frozen for a much longer time.
Meat Preservation - Tasks for preventing meat spoilage should be available: smoking, salting and drying. This results in a special type of prepared meal that does not rot, and can be included as an ingredient in other meals.
Pickling - Vegetables and perhaps some meats can be preserved by pickling them (as well as eggs, now that we have those). Storage would be in barrels or pots as normal. This results in a special type of prepared meal that does not rot, and can be included as an ingredient in other meals.
Jams/Jellies/Candied Fruits - Fruits can be preserved as jams or jellies, or by candying them in syrup or honey. This results in a special type of prepared meal that does not rot, and can be included as an ingredient in other meals.
Hot and Cold Meals - Change the kitchen options so that players could choose to make
- Hot Meals, which dwarves prefer but spoil quickly;
- Cold Meals, which do not use any fuel to make but which may spoil; or
- Preserved Meals, which do not use any fuel to make and do not spoil, but are the least desirable.
Hot and cold meals could be composed of any ingredients, preserved or not. Preserved meals are composed entirely of preserved ingredients using cold preparation and should last indefinitely. This should allow for quality meals that last, though they would not be as desirable as ready-to-eat meals. This distinction paves the way for Communal Cooking (see below in Economy section).
Booze Cellars - Allow booze stockpiles to be constrained to a specific type and age.
Water Barrels - Dwarves should be able to gather water into barrels for storage, especially given the increased need for water when brewing requires it.

Economy
Economic suggestions related to food and drink.

Trading Prepared Meals Restricted - Prepared meals cannot be sold in large quantities to trade caravans, since they would be ruined when attempting to transport them. Caravans might buy a limited number of ready meals for their own use, but should prefer buying raw ingredients and especially preserved items that can be transported long distances.
Caravan Preference for Non-Spoilable Items - Caravans should prefer non-spoiling items. Caravans would still buy in bulk any food items prepared for long term storage: cheeses, smoked and salted meats, pickled vegetables, jams and jellies, etc.
Logical Ingredient Values - Plentiful ingredients like vegetables should be inexpensive. Ingredient values should be settable in the raws or determined dynamically based on scarcity. Spices should generally have very high value.
The Hearth - The simplest form of cooking is done at a Hearth. This can be used early in the game as the first kitchen, as well as later on to provide dwarves with a means to keep food costs down (each dwarven family could have a hearth in their quarters). As with workshops, you should be able to select what dwarves may use a particular hearth.
Communal Cooking - Hot meals prepared by cooks to be ready-to-eat at a communal serving area. When a dwarf gets hungry, they come to the serving area and take a serving of "the meal of the day". Players choose what kitchens will be used to fill the meal queue. The meal queue would be reduced by dwarves taking meals from it and spoilage. When the economy kicks in, this could expand to the Tavern concept.
Restaurant / Tavern Service - Ready to serve food and drink can be sold to merchants or other travelers, or even your own dwarves. Whether outsiders are allowed to use a Tavern should be selectable. Given how plentiful food and drink currently are, dwarves could eat and drink more often, but take less time to do so. This should greatly increase the market for prepared meals over what currently exists in the game.
Head Chef - Appointing a "head chef" noble when it becomes available would allow more control over what foods are prepared at each Tavern, as well as allow for finer quality meals. A head chef would expand options/control over the Tavern menu, allowing players to choose what ingredients a Tavern is allowed to use, the quality/style of meals and drinks served at each Tavern, which cooks are assigned to prepare them, and which servants (if any) are assigned to serve them. Players could build different Taverns for different purposes; for instance, keeping one low cost for laborers, an expensive one for nobles, and a medium priced one that allows service to non-fortress dwellers for travelers.
Food Service Personnel - Servants and short order chefs could be implemented to provide a continual supply of prepared meals to the fortress nobles and possibly any wealthy travelers staying in the inn, or any dwarf at all, if your fortress is wealthy. Nobles/guests might request specific meal types and meal qualities just as they request objects, which would be obtained from the Tavern and delivered by their servant.
Trade for Water - Water should be a trade-able item. This would be especially important in desert or other hot climates where water is scarce.
Salt Trade - Salt should consistently be one of the most in-demand trade items in DF in addition due to its numerous uses and constant demand. One of the most important (and lucrative) types of mining in the ancient world was salt mining and DF should probably reflect this.

Moods
Artifact food items and other possibilities at the crossroads of moods and cooking.

Mood Creates Recipe - The result of a cooking mood could be a recipe which could become the signature dish of your fortress and perhaps even become well known throughout your civ. Food made in the style of the recipe would be known by the dwarf who made it, "Kitten Sausages a la Urist McCook". Travelers could request it.
Artifact Meals Bestow Benefits - Artifact meals could affect the dwarf who eats them in some positive way.
Moods "Unlock" Non-food Items - Successful cooking or brewing moods could open up non-toxic stones, wood, ichor, and other strange items to be allowed to be cookable and/or brewable. Gold dwarven rum, or Horse biscuits flavored with obsidian powder.

Quality
Brew and Meal Quality and ways it can be affected.

Aging - Booze, Meats, and Cheeses increase in quality when aged. (Up to a point)
Barrel Type - Some types of wood increase the quality of booze in them. Certain types of wood should perhaps be better for certain types of booze. Metal barrels should lower quality on any booze, meats, or cheese stored in them (but not veggies or other non-ageable ingredients).
Water Source - Murky or polluted water lowers the quality of booze made with it; skunky water makes for skunky beer. Aquifer water should give a quality bonus to booze made from it, since it has been filtering through rock for hundreds or thousands of years. It also happens to be rather difficult to deal with in-game, so players should be rewarded if they go out of their way to use it to make booze.
Vintage - Ingredients are assigned a random quality value each season. Spring of 751 might be an unbelievable one for plump helmets, for instance, but cave wheat from that season might not have been very good.
Notoriety - High enough quality booze might gain a special name, one that could become known as you trade it out and could be requested by travelers.
Flavor Balance - Too much of one flavor should lower the quality of a meal ("too spicy", "too salty", etc). Experienced dwarves should avoid this mistake, creating meals with better balance.

Happy Thoughts
The effects of food and drink on dwarves.

Feasts - Food and booze is set out in the dining room, and dwarves come in to enjoy it, creating happy thoughts if the meal is good. This could become available after the "Head Chef" noble is assigned.
Meal Preferences - Dwarves should prefer ready-to-eat cooked foods (Hot Meals, then Cold Meals when those run out). If none are available (or they are too expensive), they should grab an unspoiled raw fruit or vegetable along with one or two more ingredients as part of an impromptu meal. If no decent fruits or veggies are available then they should eat any cold prepared foods (Preserved Meals). If none of those are available, then they would have to eat an impromptu meal using anything edible remaining. Eating certain foods raw (like meat), or eating spoiled foods should give unhappy thoughts.
Class Differences - Dwarves' preferences for particular foods and drinks should primarily be driven by their class (higher class should mean a palate for finer foods). They should also be related to those of their friends and coworkers. If the Count, with his associated Countly preference for 30-year-old Whiskey, is best friends with Urist McSerf the Peasant, then the peasant should be able to pick up the Count's interest in fine liquor. It should also be possible for the Count to get a taste for *plump helmet biscuits* if they're masterwork. Higher-class dwarves, or at least those with a more refined palette, should want better quality versions of simple meals (or whatever), but still be able to like plain fare.
Food and Drink Taboos - Different groups should have different food and drink ingredients which they are forbidden to eat or drink. Pious dwarves that are forced to eat or drink something containing a forbidden ingredient should get an unhappy thought. Some dwarves may even choose to die of starvation or thirst if the only food or drink available is forbidden.

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