#hodmedods

[thebloopixie]

My Blootiful Sissy Pants surprised me with a care package this morning. Truly excited about this she knows how I’ve been a bit heart sick for childhood favourites of Traditional Welsh cooking and recipes I haven’t made for years. . . When I was a kid we lived on Laverbread, cockles, wind dried bacon and corned beef pies with a hearty bowl of Cawl and my Nanna Lucy’s Saffron Bara Brith. . . Sooooo living in a completely different part of the country and not having access to fresh Laverbread my sissy sent me the next best thing… sooo excited to try this!!! . . She also knows I’m always looking for local alternatives to international ingredients… yes I can make my own miso but this Umami Paste made in the UK from UK grown Fava beans is very exciting and might mean I can learn to make it myself as well!!! Truly the best gift ever!!! #bloosselfreliance #thebloopixie #gifts #mailcall #laverbread #hodmedods #childhoodfavourite #foodstagram #instafood #yum #yumyum #yummy #welshfood https://www.instagram.com/p/Cnr3yDSKvWs/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[twinstxrs]

boo *exu calamity au’s your bad kids*

[beedreamscape]

Tree of names? No no no. I want the tree Nydas gifted Patia to be some cursed/enchanted/fucked-up magic tree that just won't die.

You're not a twinkling lapis lazuli tree with black leaves and enormous pink blossoms without having been previously fucked up by magic.

[beyourselfchulanmaria]

The Spirit of Summer was commissioned by Nik Slade for the Evercreech Jack in the Green event. The contemporary folk custom is held on mayday in the Somerset village of Evercreech, celebrating the end of Winter as summer is welcomed back. Photos by Mark Pickthall

[startedwithaseed]

Peas!

Pea plants are amazing. They're a plant that feels to me like they are desperately keen to grow

An escaped seed must have sprouted, having dropped from the sheet holding a bunch of drying pea pods above it.

They're really beautiful plants, with delicate flowers and tendrils that grip and wind onto any support they can find, and they taste bloody great, especially the first pick of sugar snaps right at the start of the season. They are early cropping, and apparently the flowers cannot be fertilised (and therefore won't produce peas) above 30 degrees.

Being legumes, they fix nitrogen and so do not require lots of added inputs to the soil. The soil should be well draining though, to prevent root rot. They can be eaten at any stage - eat the shoots if you're fancy, or dry them and make pease porrige like the did in the middle ages! In fact, when they were introduced in the 1600s in Britain as the fresh vegetable (and not just a dried more like a bean) they were said to cause such a stir that people become manically addicted...

So they can be dried for storage for eating, but also of course for saving the seed. Drying and shelling peas for seed was my introduction into the world of seed saving. A perfect intro - they make it so easy for us! Simply leaving a few of the forgotten pods on the plant as long as possible, to swell up and dry, and you'll have your seed supply for next years sowing.

Dried wrinkly peas from a sugar snap variety. They are said to be properly dry when you could bite into one and not leave tooth marks.

On a larger scale, marking off a section to not harvest from at all works best, although tricky to resist the plumper pods in the forbidden section. If there are any particularly unhealthy plants, they can be removed (a process called rouging) at any point to try and avoid passing on these trait.

Peas are mostly self fertile, having "perfect" flowers (which just mean the flowers contain both the pistil and the stamen, allowing them to fertilize themselves). This means they are unlikely to cross, although the advice if you are growing more than one variety of pea to try and grow them 15 meters apart, but this can be less if they are separated by a barrier such as a hedge. Pollinators can be lazy sometimes! But, again the chance of crossing is low so it shouldn't be a big concern. Side note, thing like chickpeas (Cicer arietinum) and sweet peas (Lathyrus odoratus) are in the same family Fabaceae but not the same species so will not cross with the traditional garden peas (Pisum sativum).

Within this species there are 3 main categories -

English/podding peas. These are grown for the pea and the pod is generally too tough and fiberous to be eaten

Magetout/ snow peas. These are eaten before the peas develop and are eaten whole

Sugar snap peas. These peas were developed more recently to be the best of both worlds, the pea is eaten whole with the peas developed inside, meaning the crop is sweeter.

Within these categories, you will sometimes hear peas be refereed to as "wrinkled" or "round" seeded. This refers to how the seed looks dry, as sugar snap peas have more wrinkled seed. This is something to do with the higher sucrose content, but what it exactly does I couldn't pretend to know. There is also massive height range with different varieties of peas, and the dwarf varieties are well worth considering if you don't want to worry so much about the sturdiness of your support, or having to find something to climb on when it comes to harvesting the peas higher up.

Peas and calendula

Sitting around shelling peas can be really social and also feels satisfyingly like a kind of ancient practice, I don't know what it is about podding and shelling vegetables that appeals so much but I highly recommend it as a meditative process!

For more info, Hodmedods UK sell all sorts of dried legumes on their site, but also write articles and blogs about traditional varieties of UK grown legumes like the Carlin pea and how to cook with them.

[wardensantoineandevka]

HODMEDODS MENTION, LETS GO

[arclundarchivist]

Spoilers C3E45

Turn back, ye shits, or be SPOILED!

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Right, so first and foremost glad to see Tal back.

Secondly, hot damn Morri is terrifying, fucking Old Lady from Spongebob, AH! Real Monsters looking ass. Quite curious to see where things go with her in two weeks.

Now on to FCG, while not the biggest reveal of the session, Letters origin as a Harmonious Aeormaton is a curious thing. If they were meant to be protectors, and guardians, seemingly caretakes/companions for singular individuals was his “line” targetted exclusively, by what ever Mage caused the Care and Culling, or were “lines” like Devexian, or forms like a Hodmedods used? Also the Professor stated that he has never heard of a Aeormaton with healing abilities which further adds confusion to Letters purpose.

Did the person he was given to show him faith, and that was why they were chosen to be murdered in the first place due to rising Anti-God sentiment in the Age of Arcanum?

Also did this happen after Aeormaton’s were emancipated? Because if so, it adds another shade of darkness to his predicament as a Sleeper Agent.

But this leads me around to Ludenis, in a curious fashion, one could say. Firstly, the Hubris of this fucker is so thick you can taste it. Secondly, I’ll admit, I didn’t believe he’d be drinking his own Koolaid/acting the true believer but I am willing to accept I may have been wrong. Yet, his whole comment about “Power is just a Tool,” makes me think he does not share his Cults “devotion” to this new world, or Otohan’s belief in being “better” than baseline mortals.

I desperately wanted to hear who was on that list of Historic Ruidusborn, especially since he was so cagey about his own connection to the Moon and the Beast trapped within.

That and seeing a comment from someone made it click as to why the Ruby Vanguard(If it Was in fact them and not Otohan doing some fuckery), is that they were likely after lore regarding the Gau Drashari, if any remained, and their connection to the rituals of the Prime Deities. Could be off base, but it would be an interesting reason.

Yet, what drew my attention the most was his rant to Fearne before he left. About seeing the Wrath of the Gods first hand. Now at first blush, while the cast seemed convinced he was talking about the Calamity, I thought he was full of shit or they were just reading that wrong. After all, he is from Molaesmyr, which was destroyed in some unknown disaster, which he was indeed alive for. Yet, the fault for that disaster seemingly lies on the shoulders of Aeor and their fuckery, due to hints laid back in C2.

Yet, a thought struck me. Ludenis lived in Molaesmyr, but shit it was never stated that he was born there. He’s an Archmage, more than that an Elven Arcmage, who has long showed interests in powers that manipulate the fabric of reality and have the power to roll back the wheel of time. What if...what if Ludenis did see the Calamity, though some form of immortality or the usage of the Clone spell he survived into the modern age, but what if we go even further than that. What if he was a Mage of Aeor, what if he saw the “fear” of the Gods first hand as the “hated rivals” returned to Family once more and struck their city from the sky in an act of monumentous Divine Intervention.

A shard of Aeor landed in Molaesmyr. He could have in some shape or form landed with it. The folly that devestated the city, corrupting the Savalierwood, and eventually leading to the breaking of the Star Razor? A misstep in his attempts to finish his people’s work. After all, he said it himself Killing the Gods, “Has Been My Life’s Work.”

Hell, wouldn’t it be wild if he was behind the Care and Culling? Nah...unless!

Moving away from that crazy old bastard...we learned the likely name of Ruidus’s people: The Reilora. Somal claimed they were behind the Flairs, not Predathos, so either they are working for the entity, their likely creator and she wasn’t in the know as much as the others were, or there is some more nebulous shit going on up there. After all, like she said, some of them appeared in Flesh, while others were simply energy. But most importantly, she stated that some were kind, empathic, caring...could that just be a ploy, or is there something else going on up on that Moon. To quote the codger himself, “Creations outgrow their creators”, and that includes the purposes given to them. If Predathos created them after consuming Ethedok, and Vordo...what did he make them out of, and why would they not also wish to throw off the shackles seemingly placed on them by the divine.

I still say Ludinus’s plan is doomed to failure, likely a cataclysmic one if he “succeeds”, especially since, with the nebulous entity and existence of the Luxon, who is to say Predathos wouldn’t simply turn his attention to Exandria, even if he consumed the Gods first?

Also I saw someone say the Gods dying would be a good thing, cause the Raven Queen would get ate, allowing Vax to come back and I just...I don’t think that is how that would work at all.

Also saw another, claiming that a Ruidus win could allow CR to divorce from WoTC, since most of the Gods are pulled from base D&D content and I just...I don’t think even if they did pull away it would be anywhere near that simple.

[essektheylyss]

HODMEDODS, LET'S GO

[shiningheartvt]

A brief message from Hodmedod Ryusei

[ravendruid]

I love the word Hodmedod.

[beedreamscape]

I need Zerxus to have like a makeshift Hodmedod amidst his antiquities. People keep calling it a scarecrow and he always corrects them on it, "This is one of my old friend's creation... well, a recreation of it."

[pearlsmith25]

Barley Flakes Market 2023 Size Strong Revenue and Competitive Outlook

Barley flakes are a type of cereal grain that is made from whole barley that has been flattened and rolled into flakes. They are similar to other rolled grains like oat flakes and can be used in a variety of dishes such as porridge, granola, and baked goods. Barley flakes are a good source of dietary fiber, protein, and complex carbohydrates. They also contain vitamins and minerals such as iron, magnesium, and zinc. Some studies suggest that consuming barley flakes may help to lower cholesterol levels and reduce the risk of heart disease. To use barley flakes, you can soak them in milk or water overnight and cook them on the stove for a warm and hearty breakfast. You can also add them to smoothies or use them as a crunchy topping for yogurt or oatmeal bowls. Additionally, barley flakes can be used as a substitute for rolled oats in many recipes.

Key players operating in the global barley flakes market include King Arthur Flour Company, Inc., Honeyville, Inc., Nestlé, Kellogg, Cereal Food Manufacturing Company, Bob’s Red Mill Natural Food, Rude Health, Naturally Yours, Gaurang Foods, VLS Foods Pvt. Ltd., VEE GREEN ORGANIC LIFE CARE PRIVATE LIMITED, Nith River Milling, and Hodmedod's British Pulses & Grains.

The global barley flakes market has been growing steadily in recent years, driven by increasing consumer demand for healthier and more natural food products. The rising popularity of whole grains and plant-based diets has also contributed to the growth of the market. The market is segmented by type, application, and geography. Barley flakes are available in both organic and conventional varieties. They are used in a variety of food products such as breakfast cereals, snacks, bakery products, and animal feed. North America and Europe are the largest markets for barley flakes, followed by the Asia Pacific region.

The demand for barley flakes is expected to continue to grow in the coming years due to several factors. One of the primary drivers of demand is the increasing popularity of whole grain and plant-based diets, which emphasize the consumption of unprocessed, natural foods. Barley flakes are an excellent source of dietary fiber, protein, and complex carbohydrates, making them a healthy and nutritious option for consumers.

Additionally, the growing awareness of the health benefits associated with consuming barley flakes is also driving demand. Research has shown that consuming barley flakes can help to lower cholesterol levels, reduce the risk of heart disease, and aid in weight management.

The versatility of barley flakes is another factor contributing to their demand. They can be used in a wide range of food products, including breakfast cereals, snacks, bakery products, and animal feed. This versatility makes them a popular choice among food manufacturers, who are constantly looking for new and innovative ingredients to incorporate into their products.

Finally, the increasing availability of barley flakes in supermarkets and health food stores is also contributing to their demand. Consumers are becoming more aware of the health benefits associated with consuming whole grains, and as a result, are seeking out products like barley flakes that are both healthy and convenient.

There are several advantages to the barley flakes market, including:

Health benefits: Barley flakes are a rich source of dietary fiber, protein, and complex carbohydrates, making them a nutritious and healthy food option. Research has also shown that consuming barley flakes can help to lower cholesterol levels, reduce the risk of heart disease, and aid in weight management.

Versatility: Barley flakes can be used in a wide range of food products, including breakfast cereals, snacks, bakery products, and animal feed. This versatility makes them a popular choice among food manufacturers who are looking for new and innovative ingredients to incorporate into their products.

Sustainability: Barley is a relatively sustainable crop that requires less water and fertilizer than other grains like wheat and corn. This makes barley flakes an environmentally friendly food option.

Market growth: The global market for barley flakes has been growing steadily in recent years, driven by increasing consumer demand for healthier and more natural food products. This growth is expected to continue in the coming years, providing opportunities for producers and manufacturers.

Cost-effective: Barley flakes are generally more affordable than other grains like oats, making them a cost-effective ingredient for food manufacturers.

[thebloopixie]

Breakfast this morning is 4 pieces of malted granary toast with…. . . 1. Marmite and Banana 2. @hodmedods Umami Paste and Banana 3. Tahini, Sunflower Seeds and Apple 4. Raspberry Jam, Chia Seeds and Apple. . . It’s shopping day and the last thing I want to do is go there hungry. I have to admit having the pantry where I can see it is making a huge difference to what I can make. Things that need using because I forgot they were there. . . Oh and today I have not used any butter or margarine or equivalent type spread. I know for me in the past it was a texture thing which is why I did it. Because let’s be honest who doesn’t like lashings of butter on fresh baked bread or toast but I use too much. . . I know that and while I sit here typing this and munch on this toast… honestly I think it would spoil it. Not only texture wise but taste wise. . . So toast and butter is either a thing of the past or something I will save for when I make a fresh loaf of bread. Which is good cos it’s that one less thing. #bloosselfreliance #thebloopixie #beakfast #brekky #toast #plantbased #plantbasedwholefood #vegetarianfood #veganfood #foodstagram #instafood #yum #yumyum #yummy https://www.instagram.com/p/Cn0_puyKJBm/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[fuzzysparrow]

Which rural character is called a Mommet in Somerset, a Hodmedod in Berkshire and a Tattie Bogle in Scotland?

A scarecrow is a humanoid usually made of sticks and straw. It is dressed in old clothes and placed in a field to frighten birds away. In the United Kingdom, there are several different dialects, which have led to a wide range of names for scarecrows, including Mommet (Somerset), Hodmedod (Berkshire), Tattie Bogle (Scotland), Gallybagger (Isle of Wight), Mawkin (Sussex) and Bwbach (Wales).

Scarecrows have been around since time immemorial. They are used throughout the world by farmers and appear in many cultures. The oldest surviving book in Japan, 'Kojiki' (712 AD), records a scarecrow deity known as Kuebiko, who cannot walk but knows everything about the world. Scarecrows also appear in western fiction, such as 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz' (1900) by L. Frank Baum, and 'Worzel Gummidge' (1936) by Barbara Euphan Todd.

In England, many rural areas hold an annual scarecrow competition or festival, which usually involves members of the public building scarecrows with the aim to win a prize for the best one at the show. Although scarecrows are an age-old idea, festivals only began in the 1990s and early 2000s, such as the Urchfont Scarecrow Festival in Wiltshire and the Scarecrow Weekend in Worcestershire. Further afield, festivals are held in Illinois and Pennsylvania in the USA, and in Canada, where they are known as pumpkin people.

[choclette8]

A comforting and filling vegan stew for these dark winter nights. You can easily swap the British carlin peas for a pulse of your choice if you find them hard to get hold of. But you can get them and other British grown pulses and grains from the fabulous @hodmedods #carlinpeas #britishpulses #britishpeas #homemade #howtocook #tinandthyme #recipeontheblog #cookblogshare #scrumptiouskitchen #thefeedfeed #foodblogger #thekitchn #scrumptioustribe #vegetarianfoodshare #vegansofig #howveganseat #instayum #plantbased #govegan #eatthis #veganeats #veganstew #eattherainbow #eatcolourful #hodmedods #veganuary https://www.instagram.com/p/CnMhk7xL606/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[catgirlthecrazy]

A couple additional thoughts:

My sense of Aeor and Avalir is that they had way, way more mages per capita than you would find in Exandria today. In the first episode of Calamity, Brennan describes Excelsior Plaza like this:

all the mortals you can see here are involved in artifice or wizard craft or sorcery or pursuing their studies as a bard, engaged in the great work of this age.

Now, obviously this was just the fancy rich people part of town, we don't really know what occupations people in poorer districts of these places would have. But when you consider just how much of these cities' infrastructure needed magic to function, it seems likely that they would need a large, magically educated workforce to build, operate, and maintain it all. So it doesn't seem all that crazy to think that having at least a few levels in bard or wizard or artificer was at least as common in the flying cities as having a tertiary degree is in most first-world countries today. Even just having the equivalent of the magic initiate feat (two cantrips and one first level spell) would likely have been even more common.

All of this to say: there were probably a lot of people who could cast Prestidigitation running around. Even if you don't know someone who can cast it, you probably know people that do. And one thing that Prestidigitation can do is make food taste better. The bland food that Create Food and Water makes probably wouldn't seem like such a hardship if you could just magic it into tasting like the best mac n cheese you've ever had right before eating it. Splurging on real food that doesn't need magic to be appetizing could be something you save for special occasions.

Another thing to consider: if an Alchemy Jug can make a few gallons of beer/honey/mayonnaise/oil/ vinegar/wine each day and still be considered only an "uncommon" magic item, then it's not difficult to imagine, for example, a Cauldron of Endless Soup or Basket of Endless Bread or whatever that can feed people on an industrial scale. Sure, creating enough such items to feed an entire city would probably require a massive one-time investment of resources, but compared to the crazy amount of magic infrastructure those places had (carrowhulks, aeormatons, hodmedods, giant TV screens, eldritch betteries, etc), not all that much.

I can imagine there having been a network of what were essentially public soup kitchens where any citizen could go to get a hot meal for free three times a day. It's the same limited menu day in day out, so it's not most people's first choice, but it ensures that no one in the city has to starve if outside trade breaks down. This would be hugely valuable to the mages running the place, because it provides insurance against food riots that doesn't leave them beholden to foreign powers. (Or worse, clerics. Le gasp.)

Feeding a Flying City

[Aeor, by Pretty Useful Co.]

This started as a little exercise in my worldbuilding thoughts for some off-hand stuff mentioned in my current fic, but I uh. Got Into It. So enjoy, if you're into two thousand words of nerding out about fantasy economics and agriculture and spells. For the sake of context, this is specifically looking at Exandria's flying cities in the Age of Arcanum, working off D&D 5E's rules as written (so I'm avoiding inventing spells).

When tackling the Age of Arcanum in my fanfic, I knew going in that I wanted to use this space to stretch my worldbuilding muscles and fill in some of the space left by Matthew Mercer and Brennan Lee Mulligan with reasonably plausible meat and bones.

One thing I was excited to squint at was the issue of how the hell flying cites feed their populations. 

The ‘lonely city’ is a common fantasy trope, especially in visual media. Your towering bastion of civilization (or spire of evil) on the open plains, or beside a river, or deep in the mountains certainly makes for a great symbol. A flying city is really the ultimate version of this, completely disconnected from the petty ground below… and the farmland that usually would surround any metropolis. 

See, in medieval times, you only had so much time to transport good until they spoiled. Some could be more forgiving than others - however, given a city often aggregates political and financial elite, there is an expectation that they can get their fresh fruits, and decadent game. Even beyond freshness, if you have a lot of people in one place who are not actively growing their own crops, a lot of more-or-less processed food needs to get into the city daily. And though you could station your acres of farmland just over the hill so they don’t ruin the ~scenic approach~, that will cost more to transport. The fact is, having a lot of people - poor and rich - in one place requires a lot of food, every day, to feed them. And it has to come from somewhere.

(Off-topic note, medieval castles (not necessarily cities) were also there to, y’know, defend the populace. So they had to be both near enough to their peasants to respond to aggression, and near enough for the people to get to the castle for shelter when needed. Which is not relevant to this point.)

Magic, like refrigeration, greenhouses and GMO crops, allows a society to sidestep some of these issues. Which is great! But how the flying cities could use the resources they have to feed their population is half the fun in theorizing. 

To quickly recap what we know to be common to flying cities of the time:

Limited to the city only, usually a location with ground dense with brumestone (i.e., no farmland). 

Their limited ‘undergrounds’ are often fairly dense with more structures (Aeor’s many levels; the labyrinth and tons of administrative locations inside Avalir).

They are nomadic and engage in trade (both with eachother and grounded cities, like Vasselheim).

… but they all likely came from landed roots, and potentially were once perfectly normal cities. 

So. How do you feed your people while flying a path that might take years to travel (ex: Avalir’s 7-year trek), especially between trade stops?

The last surviving flying city is Draconia, which is really fragments of a larger nomadic city that decided to remain fairly sedentary compared to its predecessors. Its answer was probably pretty simple: given that Draconia hovered within Dreemoth Ravine, the tailed dragonborn could just… collect a tithe of crops from the enslaved ravenites. It’s already canon that they were put to work in the mines, so working the land also unfortunately makes sense. It’s unclear how the food then got up to the city (skyships, given they have ready brumestone access?), but given Draconia seems to be an exception to the rules I can (mostly) confidently rule out ‘the Age of Arcanum was built on abusing the grounded cities and towns, potentially requiring an age of magically-enhanced farming to provide for the people above and/or risking the farmers going hungry in favor of the mageocracies’. 

Here’s where magic offers numerous solutions, and just as many weird problems! 

First of all, the stupidly isolated nature of flying cities means that any method of bringing food in has to be extremely structured. Mom and pop can’t just bring the donkey to the farmer’s market to sell their goods in Avalir; to get there you need to fly (more scheduled) or teleport (requires a mage, and limited quantities of goods). So from the getgo a lot of financial control is likely in the cities’ hands. Which… is not all too dissimilar from history, but the lack of flexibility is probably more striking here. Shit, I was hoping to get away from Draconia’s grim worldbuilding.

It also places flying cities in a role very similar to an advancing army, requiring food as they march to be drawn from the surrounding lands. While soldiers can break off and loot towns they pass through, a flying city probably can’t just dock in the middle of farmland, grab all the corn and bolt. So the need for a more organized food transport likely helps protect towns from that exploitation. (Though, with the military posturing of Avalir and Aeor, I could see flying cities strong-arming support from grounded ones in exchange for promised protection/aid if they needed it.)

Of course, when docked at another city (Avalir stayed at Vasselheim for ten days in the weeks before the Calamity), they can fairly easily trade with the surrounding towns there… who are also providing for the existing city. Hosting a flying city must be a huge logistics nightmare, but economically worth the headache. 

(Vasselheim likely has a leg up in that it has both a sitting population of mages, such as Vespin pre-fuckup, and the likes of Clerics, who I’ll get to soonish.)

In EXU: Calamity, skyships (and an offhand mention of something called an ornithopter) already exist, which could facilitate the bulk transport of goods. Based on the speed of the Silver Sun in Campaign 3 (4-5 days to cover ~700 miles translates to a speed of ~5-6.5 knots; for context that seems to be about the middling range for a medieval tradeship), this seems like an excellent way of transporting goods that do not spoil easily. Or use arcane equivalents to the canon Bag of Colding to help keep things fresh longer. However, as noted above, this would require a lot of community organization to get crops together when the skyship shows up for harvest.

The tricky thing is that Avalir, at least, follows leylines as it travels. So if there was intent to line up its passes over farmland with their harvest season - to minimize transport distance - it might be difficult to coordinate. Moreover, with an implied many flying cities, and no clear territorial delimitations between their routes (especially if they’re all following leylines; but Avalir at least made stops in Issylra, Gwessar/Tal’Dorei, and Dorumas/the Shattered Teeth at least), I wonder if there would be economic conflict over which cities could be highest bidder for the freshest crops. Which could be Interesting. 

(I wonder if sky piracy, or sky privateering, was a thing in the Age of Arcanum. Nydas is said to have been a pirate on the actual seas, so aquatic trade is still going strong, but given the flying cities are so reliant on limited methods to get food… you could put a lot of pressure on a rival city by capturing a few key skyships full of the last harvests before winter.)

Another option is teleportation. Avalir, after all, has an entire guild devoted to teleporting people around, so critical to its functioning that part of the Betrayers’ plan was to leave them without leadership when they struck. However, teleportation is very much a creature-oriented form of transportation; perhaps you could bring up a herd of cattle for slaughter, but that’s a pretty damn high spell slot for beef.

Avalir is in a fortuitous situation, in that it has a longstanding relationship with the Gau Drashari; druids, well-known masters of plant and animal life. In theory, this could mean Plant Growth casts to increase harvests… but at this time the Gau Drashari specifically only live in Caithmoira, guarding this holy site. So hopping from one druid-boosted farmland to another is unlikely. 

Well, if transporting food to the cities is such an issue, why not produce food in the cities?

While magical greenhouses must account for some luxury fresh goods for sure, I really don’t think the cities as illustrated have enough real estate to actually support their whole populations like this. Like I noted above, of the two cities we know really well, their insides are already full of labs and labyrinths and all sorts of things probably best kept away from your food supply. 

D&D 5E spells offer another answer, and another piece of potentially complicated worldbuilding: Create Food and Water. Per the spell description, it creates enough food to feed 15 people for 24 hours, which seems to neatly solve all our problems! Until you realize the food is explicitly bland (bet you the mages turn up their noses at it), vanishes if not consumed after 24 hours (so that’s a daily 3rd level spell slot from some poor schmuck), and is mostly limited to Paladins and Clerics. You know, godly people, who are so fondly looked upon by the mageocracies. Artificers, at least, are more in line with the Age of Arcanum attitude - but we don’t see any in Calamity, so it’s unclear if the class ‘exists’ per say in the time period. Reducing powerful Paladins and Clerics to food dispensaries - and not even good food, probably for the lower class - would fit in neatly with how the powers of the divine are seen as lesser. Goodberry falls into a similar role: useful, but probably something mages would avoid.

Speaking of spells, let’s get a little fucked up, hm? Who is to say a mage couldn’t just. Summon some pigs to be served up as bacon tomorrow? Well. Conjure Animals specifically says the animals are actually fey, and vanish when their HP reaches 0. Summon Beasts? Same thing. Find Steed? You guessed it. So magic can help us grow food, and transport it, and preserve it, but not actually make it out of nothing. (If there’s a spell I’m missing that completely solves this, please let me know, but I can’t really find one.)

My final little thought came watching geese migrate some time ago. The passenger pigeon has been extinct for… a hundred and ten years, now. But in its hayday, flocks of the birds would literally cloud the sky. Exandria is home to far more stunning beasts than pigeons, and hunting flying game is likely a lot easier when you yourself are flying too. 

Sure, you can apply this to actual fishing when the cities are over the seas, but! Imagine fishing boats but for birds and all manner of winged beasts in great flocks, netting and catching them to haul in. Maybe the magical equivalent of those helicopter boar hunts to deal with invasive populations, but landing at all introduces a whole lot more hassle. Big net and flying device = fresh meat, with an arcane twist.

So: how do you feed a flying city? Especially one with a lavish lifestyle as seen in Avalir, or a hard research focus as in Aeor?

Have an extremely regimented relationship with the towns on your path (likely in competition with other flying cities using these leylines when you are) or that otherwise have food you need. Make sure skyships arrive in time for the harvests. Miss that and things get dicey. 

Supplement this with trade, both with other flying cities and grounded ones when docked. However, docked time has to be limited to not risk starving out the countryside surrounding the city hosting you.

Small deliveries, especially of fresh livestock, can be accomplished through Porter’s Guild or equivalent.

Magically preserve food thus obtained to survive until your schedule and harvests of X Y z goods next align. 

City-based organizations can ‘fish’ for birds as the city flies (or potentially even actually fish as they fly over the ocean) for fresh meat.

Hope to gods (but without hoping to the gods because they’re schmucks) that you time your pick-ups right, that there are no famines, or early frosts, that no one steals your fucking skyships our outbids you on a key agricultural contract, or casts Dispel Magic and makes your food all spoil.

When the carefully-scheduled management of the city’s resources fails, turn to your diviners or healers and have them feed the masses with bland crackers while the Somnovem or Ring of Gold continue eating honeyed lamb and figs. 

If you read this far, I'm super flattered you shifted through my rambles! I'll gladly discuss any glaring mistakes or things I've overlooked; this is only what I considered in worldbuilding for a fic, and I don't pretend to be an expert on medieval agriculture or economic practices.

This was still very fun to (over)think about <3

(Water, of course, would be a similar limiting factor, but is easy enough to magically purify, and would not be too bland when made by Create Food and Water, so I didn’t bring it up.)