Gathered fruits and Prepared Victuals
Koozum Nut
The Bog that covers the shores of the East is a place teeming with animal life but few crops grow in the peat, but the land is merciful by hanging its greatest harvest on the end of a tree branch. The Koozum tree bares a fruit with a hard shell, bitter fruit but a delicious pit when roasted, this is the Koozum nut.
These nuts are consumed regularly by the Small folk of the bog, roasted and smoked, regularly between meals. The nuts also make a flour when ground and mixed with a small amount of boiled water and salts that the small folk use for various dumplings that are fried to perfection.
The Koozum fruit is too bitter a taste to eat for the small folk but they distill it into a potent alcohol. Unfortunate is the fact that the Koozum nut causes stomach ails in the lizard folk of the bog, and so when the two cultures mixed they found a disconnect in cuisines. However, recently an observant lizard-folk alchemist observed the Rozzot Bird eating the nuts and deduced that of one was to boil the stomach of a Rozzot with Koozum then the nut’s stomach churning chemical would be neutralized. Now it’s very common to see a vendor selling Rozkoozum with Koozum nuts to indicate which is safe for the lizard-folk to enjoy.
Quif Reed Oil
The land that rises unevenly from the watery tributaries and creeks in the bogs is lined with Quif Reed, a rather pretty plant in the spring when it’s furry and usually greyish head bristles with purple tendrils. The Lizard-folk process the reed but taking the budding head in spring, full of seeds, in large metal caldrons where they dry them in heat while the stems dry in the sun. They then make a nest like basket for the heated seeds and compress them into pucks with a system using rope, wood, and metal like fulcrums. Many pucks are then further pressed between large hewn stones that press the seeds into a fine oil, collected in grooves of the stone.
The Quif Reed Oil is a rarity in the lands, no finer oil for cooking bubbling fried foods such as the ones enjoyed by the Bog’s Small folk, or cleaner oil for running one’s lantern at night. (though, funny enough, bog folk prefer peat.)This oil is the main export of the bog and how the folk within get many wonders from outside their trappings, sugar and salt being primary amount those.
Having been taught for years to keep secrets, the Lizardfolk refused to reveal how they hew the stones for the pressing process but a master will gift those apprentice their stones when their training is complete, and the new presser is expected to figure out the hewing on their own.
Ghuncha
What Ghuncha is will differ on who in the bog you ask. It’s commonality throughout is that it is a meat of a bird, but what bird really depends on which is most common in that area in that given season. The Bog has no room for large bison like creatures that herd but it has plentiful birds, and as such their meat finds it’s way into most dishes.
One of many Smallfolk dishes use Ghuncha in a winter stew, made in a large iron pot that’s never left to sit as long as the earth frosts, each day more wood is added to the coals and more ingredients to the pot. The stew evolves as the winter does, gaining new Jampun bark and leafy herbs weekly but Ghuncha and Turnips rotate ideally daily. You can tell if a host likes you by if they scoop from the middle of the pot instead of deep or right off the top. The stew is always top with Koozum dumplings. One dish the lizard folk make with Ghuncha is a meatball that uses the organs of the bird mixed with a stinging tree ant that gives it a peculiar spice. The traditional way to combine the two is to wrap the organs in a bog grass bundle and hang it on a branch of the tree the ants inhabit, and wait for them to swarm to snip the grass and have it fall into a waiting grinding stone bowl. The Meatball is seared in Quif Reed Oil or fully fried depending on the enjoyer’s tolerance to the irony tang of blood.
Berries of the Bogs
The Bogs are not an environment made for just any plant to grow and so while trees are plentiful in some areas there are no fruit bearing trees in the bogs, but there is however many a berry bush. Berries are a key plant in the diet of the many species of birds that call the Bogs home as well as the people who inhabit the Bogs. The most enjoyed berries by lizardfolk are the shrine and yennelberries, while smallfolk also enjoy shrine, cloudberry and blueberries but are unfortunately commonly allergic to yennelberries.
Bird species of the bog happily eat Yewberries which are poisonous to most species and pontoberries which are incredibly hot and burning to touch to all other species.
Compotes and jams made from the various berries are a saving grace during the colder winter months, when most food sources lie in hibernation or are frozen beneath ice, leaving the bogs with a scarce supply of flavorful ingredients. These preserves, however, are just one way berries are used in the bogs. Though unaccustomed to eating cloudberries, the lizardfolk have developed a pleasantly sharp vinegar from them, which is used prominently in bog cooking. Meanwhile, the smallfolk favor a wine fermented from shrineberries or blueberries, brews they hold in high regard. Pontoberries also have been given a second purpose as they are used by lizardfolk alchemists in a popular potion used to keep lizardfolk warm and active in cold climates.
Quibelcan Eggs
One of the largest avians in the eastern bogs are the two headed Quibelcan, one head equipped with a large gulleted throat and a smaller head on a snake-like neck with a needle-sharp beak that can pierce even bone. They have been the most dangerous avian species in the bogs since the lizardfolk first made their home there, but in recent years as seasons shift their population has exploded. To fight this threat there has been a campaign to harvest the eggs of this dangerous raptor by locals, in a controlled fashion.
The eggs contain two yolks and a shared white, the smaller of the two yolks has a richer flavour with a touch of almost a brine while the larger yolk is more subtle and buttery. Now when preparing a Quibelcan egg you can crack and mix the double yolk and white entirely and by no means will you have a bad experience but gourmets and locals prefer preparing the eggs in a more intentional way. First you separate the small yolk in a separate cup and then take the large yolk and white and either mix them or boil them together, if boiling be very careful to place gently into already boiling water that has been recently stirred to help the egg stay together. Now with the small yolk mix water with cloudberry vinegar into the yolk until thick and add some quiff reed oil to make a silky sauce to place over the cooked egg, placed on-top of flatbread and enjoy a small piece of heaven.