Verse:Chlouvānem Inquisition: Difference between revisions
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===Cuisine=== | ===Cuisine=== | ||
Chlouvānem cuisine is extremely varied and every region has its own signature dishes. What can be generalized is the influence of Yunyalīlti philosophy on Chlouvānem food and eating culture. Emphasizing restraining from unnecessary violence, | Chlouvānem cuisine is extremely varied and every region has its own signature dishes. What can be generalized is the influence of Yunyalīlti philosophy on Chlouvānem food and eating culture. Emphasizing restraining from unnecessary violence, Chlouvānem food is often vegan; it should however be noticed that Calemerian humans have a different metabolism from Earthly humans and it is impossible for them to completely avoid meat<ref>Chlouvānem sources do not distinguish meat and fish.</ref> in the long term. Still, Chlouvānem people follow, due to their religious worldview, a diet that usually minimizes the eating of meat: the Inquisition has the lowest rate of meat consumption pro capita on Calémere. | ||
'''Note''' that even the English translations of Chlouvānem terms for foods and especially plants are not perfect matches; they are similar-looking, similarly-used, or similar-tasting plants/foods, that may have even very noticeable differences compared to those of Earth. All terms are given in the singular, except when noted. | '''Note''' that even the English translations of Chlouvānem terms for foods and especially plants are not perfect matches; they are similar-looking, similarly-used, or similar-tasting plants/foods, that may have even very noticeable differences compared to those of Earth. All terms are given in the singular, except when noted. | ||
The | An usual Chlouvānem meal is eaten communally, with food being served in large bowls and plates placed in the center of a table and then taken by the diners; foods are eaten either by hand or with chopsticks, and soups with spoons; forks and knives are however commonly used in the Northwest due to Western Calemerian influences. Dishes served in a single meal are meant to be eaten together, and are often contrasting - sweet and salty, spicy and mild, hot and cold. The two most typical types of dishes are stews (''chlemyoe'') and curries (''mėlita''); they are similar in appearance, but ''chlemyenī'' are generally less thick than curries and served in bowls, while ''mėlitai'' are thicker and served on plates; also, the omnipresent accompanying rice is typically cooked along with stews, but separately from curries and served on different plates. In countless variations, these dishes are found all across the country.<br/>Among popular dishes that are not stews or curries, ''rānāmi'' is a particularly popular one - it is a full plate of spiced rice with a cream of chickpeas and/or beans, optionally flavoured with either ''jvyarñuɂah'' (a typical delicacy of the Līlasuṃghāṇa area - a cream made from moldy and aged ''jvyara'' berry pulp) or ''vyāvamouka'' (a mustard paste), with usually ''ilьnīkai'' (fried vegetable balls) inside them - in some riverine communities, variants with eels may be found instead. | ||
====Ingredients==== | |||
The staple foods of Chlouvānem cuisine common to all areas are rice (''lūdya''<ref>Uncooked rice is called ''maʔika''.</ref>), sticky rice (''ñañām''), soy (''miltai''), purple yam (''hunai''), lentils (''mahīra''), chickpeas (''gubham''), many kinds of nuts (generically ''dāneh''), and, among greens, various kinds of cabbages (''hauša'', ''šųlah'', and ''prāšan'' being three of the most common ones). Spices are extensively used, as are many fruits, both fresh and pickled. With only a few exceptions (most notably tea, cocoa, and cane sugar), Chlouvānem cuisine is also often local well into modern society; buying products and ingredients from elsewhere in the country is not a common practice. | |||
The ingredients used in Chlouvānem cuisine are extremely different from place to place, which reflects the tropical climate of most of the nation and its abundance of fruits and other agricultural products. In most of the country, fresh fruit is commonly eaten throughout the whole day, and in most cities there are trees - especially of coconuts and bananas, that are extensively grown throughout the whole country - that can be harvested freely by citizens. | |||
The Yunyalīlta forbids "unnecessarily privating fellow living beings of freedom" (cited various times in all three books of the Chlamiṣvatrā), so that meat is generally only harvested through hunting and fishing (only a few species of poultry and the ''hālotsa'', a goat-like animal, were traditionally kept in farms and eaten), so that in areas that do not have significant fishing opportunities meat is quite rare and expensive. Fish is more common, due to the abundance of rivers and the enormous coastline: 90% of meat eaten in the country is fish. Dairy food is almost nonexistant in most of the country (it should be noted that the most prominent domestic animal in past and present Chlouvānem society, the ''lalāruṇa'', is a reptile - and furthermore it is sacred for Yunyalīlti people, so that neither it nor its eggs are eaten). Entomophagy is very common, particularly in the southern regions, where larvae and worms are used in many meat-based dishes. Traditionally, insect eating has not been as avoided as other types of meat, especially where some insect species may be harmful to the local agricultural production. | |||
Except for some areas where agricultural output is not enough due to climate and/or geographical conditions, namely on some islands, deserts, or areas of high mountains or taiga, meat is a small part of the diet, present in only about two or three meals each lunar phase.<br/> | |||
Due to the relative rarity and fluctuating disponibility of meat, most of it is preserved in some way in order to conserve it. Pickled, smoked, jellied, or fermented fish are commonly found in Chlouvānem ''luvāye''. | |||
====''Poucicænai''==== | |||
The term ''poucicænai'' (singular ''poucicænah'' - a double diminutive of ''pouka'' "taste") refers to a vast series of Chlouvānem foods which are commonly eaten as entrées or apéritifs, but may also be served together with main meals or as snacks during the day. There are countless variations of foods that may be classified as ''poucicænai'', but they all have in common the fact of being mostly cold or usually only cooked for a short time (with some exceptions, such as ''skaglanåmai''), usually vegetable-only, and are served either as small snack-like servings or in buffets. ''Poucicænai'' are only savoury - similar sweet foods are usually categorized as candies. Foods commonly served as ''poucicænai'' are:
| |||
* ''skaglanåmā'' (pl. ''-nåmai'') - small potatoes boiled in salted water and served hot but covered in cold sauces; | |||
* ''smurṇūlia'' (pl. ''-ṇūliai'') - small portions of rice, sesame, and cutted vegetables (often tomatoes, carrots, or spinach) wrapped in cabbage leaves; | |||
* Various types of salads such as ''nānemæchliė'' (with mixed vegetables and fried bread) or ''širṣmæchliė'' (with tomatoes, okra, onions, and distinctively spiced with anise). | |||
====Breakfast==== | |||
Breakfast (''ājvalunai'', literally "dawn tea") is an important meal among Chlouvānems. Different areas of the Inquisition have different breakfast habits — some areas prefer a sweet breakfast (as in the South, where a fast, workday breakfast is usually as simple as tea with lots of fruit; or in the Northwest, where Western colonial influence means that sweet bread rolls are more common), while others have a generally savoury one. Tea is, however, common everywhere - breakfast teas are often strong but usually more sweetened. | |||
Some common breakfast dishes were born as a way to use the previous day's leftovers, for example the very common Jade Coastal ''drabhyaše'' (nowadays eaten not only at breakfast, but a very common fast food) - savoury pancakes, kinda like Japanese [[w:Okonomiyaki|okonomiyaki]], with noodles as their base. Steamed rice is also commonly eaten both with savoury and sweet breakfast. | |||
A typical breakfast in most of the eastern Plain and in the Jade Coast, which is also a general menu popular elsewhere in the nation, consists of steamed rice with pickled fruits or vegetables or fresh fruit, savoury ''drabhyaše'' pancakes with various toppings (lentil- or chickpea-based gravy is common, or hot ''paren'' (a cheese-like spread made of nuts or beans) and/or sweet ''pahālyekye'' - rice [[w:Gnocchi|gnocchi]] served hot and eaten in a bowl of (cold) coconut milk; drinks include tea (sometimes, especially in Ilėnimarta, with some special sweet small buns, not unlike French brioches) and fruit juice. Meat breakfast dishes may serve grilled or pickled fish, often eels, with the rice. | |||
====Drinks==== | |||
Tea (''lunai'') is without any doubt the most popular beverage in the Inquisition. Calemerian tea is actually quite different from Earthly tea in habitat - it grows in hilly areas around the wet coast of the Plain, so that most of the Flæmvasta Sea basin is dotted with tea plantations. 93% of tea production on Calémere is in the Inquisition, and about 98% of tea produced in the Inquisition is consumed there - the average Chlouvānem drinks tea about four times a day. Other kinds of infusions - generally called ''humaimaila'' ("herb water") - are also extremely popular, and are also served in ''lunaikeikai'' - "tea houses", or the most popular kind of drinking establishment in the Inquisition.<br/> | |||
Coffee (the beverage is ''verkmaila'', the plant and beans are ''verka'') is also known but it is only grown in some areas of the Western Inquisition and it is nowhere as popular as tea, not even in the West. | |||
The most popular soft drink is ''kolecañėh'', which is a [[w:Kvass|kvas]]-like drink made from fermented bread. | |||
===Holidays=== | ===Holidays=== | ||