Dinner Party

After setting the fish and venison down, Weiss turned back to the rabbits.

It'll take about an hour to cook these, twenty minutes for the rice, and only around ten for the venison and fish, so starting with the rabbits and working on the others while they cooked would be most efficient.

"It's still going to be a few hours until the others return, so I'm just going to prep stuff right now. First up, when cooking meals, there is a surefire way to enhance the flavor of anything!"

Willow tilted her head.

"Spices?"

"No, it's marination! Let the delicious flavors seep into the meat before cooking, and everything will suddenly become much tastier!"

Weiss poked her finger at the venison.

"This is meat from the backstraps of a deer, and it's frozen from being stored in the ice room. I moved it to the edge of the room yesterday, so it should be thawed out in time to cook later. The fish is fresh, caught from the river yesterday!"

Weiss then began walking around the kitchen, gathering up various ingredients for the upcoming meal.

"For the rabbit marinade, we'll have olive oil, garlic, rosemary, white wine, salt, and pepper!"

Edol looked at the ingredients Weiss was fetching, a doubting look on his face. Ghost, still standing atop his shoulder, also was a bit dumbfounded by the variety of seasonings.

The olive oil was stored in a murky, off-colored glass bottle, and the other ingredients were stored in similar containers. It made everything look considerably less appetizing than when inside clear containers, but after measuring out portions, Edol could see that the actual seasonings were in good conditions.

"Wow… Edol, all these spices are hella expensive. To even have glass bottles for fresh greens too, how do they have so much money?"

Noticing the look on Edol's face, Weiss took the opportunity to explain.

"Everyone pools in to get good ingredients for food here, and since we have a partnership with most other hunting and trapping towns in the north, we still make good profits on pelts that we sell."

With everyone pooling together resources and donating meat from their hunts, the entire town was able to enjoy delicious meals year-round.

Thinking about the great display of neighbor-ship, Edol suddenly recalled that he hadn't seen any stores on their walk into town. There also hadn't been any mention of money, and it looked like all these expensive ingredients were left out where anyone could easily steal them. With all this, Edol began wondering if the people here even used money.

"Eh, not really in town. If someone needs anything, everyone here is willing to share, it's good to lend a helping hand. Almost everyone here is either a full-time resident or lives primarily in Edain, only two days of riding south."

The type of very small town where everyone knows everyone, to the point that they're all practically family. They even all eat together and combine their wealth for purchases, so money had all but lost its meaning in Hearth.

"Besides, it's just us old folks who live up here. All the kids want to move south, to Edain or further. It's only the folks who fail in their adventures and retreat back up north who stick around here. Only us oldies and some grandkids who come to visit for the summer."

Weiss didn't look all that old to Edol, but he didn't have a chance to comment before Weiss thrusted one of the rabbits at him.

"Either of you kids skin a rabbit before?"

Both Edol and Willow shook their heads, and Weiss snorted in disappointment.

…

Omitted.

…

Willow gleefully patted Edol's shoulder, looking satisfied with her work. Edol, on the other hand, stared down at his hands.

'The cost of cooking is truly great…'

Growing up Edol had always eaten his parents' cooking, and after going to college ate almost exclusively cheap meals and cafeteria food, so it was his first time dealing with a recently-alive animal.

'I shall remember you, unnamed rabbit.'

Completely ignoring Edol's 'shock', Weiss was mixing together the marinade in a pan, humming as she scooped some of the mix to drizzle over the rabbit.

After finishing setting up the marinade, Weiss set it to the side and began setting out plates for the meal. There were roughly forty people in the town at the moment, too many for a single table. Instead, the plates were spread out across a few smaller tables and on the counter Nes had leaned over before. After exploring the town hall, Edol had found that said counter was the storage area for most of the alcohol, and was reminiscent of a bar counter after stools were placed around it.

Time passed, and a short while after Weiss put the rabbit into a compartment of the fireplace, other townsfolks started trickling in. Apparently everyone knew what time they should come back, as old Nes and a group of kids soon entered, their ages ranging from toddlers to early teens.

Anyone coming back with game would stop in the kitchen where Weiss had prepared the rabbits earlier and start cleaning their prey, taking care not to damage the pelts.

After finishing with their own game, most would deposit it in the ice room before returning to help other hunters with their animals.

Soon a festive mood took over the hall, and the once large and empty feeling space now bustled with friendly people.

Many of the hunters came up to greet Edol, amazed by the giant eagle resting on his shoulder. Soon, "Nibbles's" origin story had spread all through camp, and everyone looked at the unfortunate flightless bird with pity.

It wasn't long before everyone who'd gone out hunting that morning made it back to the town, and batches of food began making their way off the fire and onto peoples' plates.

Tears came to Edol's eyes as he tasted something other than potatoes or unseasoned fish for the first time in months. The townsfolk might have spent extravagant amounts of money to acquire all the ingredients for the meal, but after tasting the food, Edol decided that it was definitely worth it.

'So delicious!'

The rabbit, roasted to perfection after being marinated for over an hour had become tender enough that the meat seemed to melt in the brit's mouth with each bite, and the unbeatable flavor of fresh garlic and rosemary only accentuated the meat's perfection.

Venison steaks, after given a light coat of olive oil before grilling along with a light sprinkling of salt and black pepper tasted better than any beef steak Edol'd tried back on earth.

Grilled fish over fried rice, again olive oil paired with fresh greens mixed into the rice made for a wondrous flavor.

'Mom, Dad… I'm sorry. I may have a new favorite cook."