Mud-Baked Fish

Mud-Baked Fish (or Mud Fish) is a simple dish common in eastern Dimaerune, especially in Mudvein. The dish is simple enough: take any fish, seal it in mud, and bake it until cooked. Once cooked, the mud casing is chipped away and the fish served. The mud from The Mud Forest imparts a unique flavor to the fish. Most describe it as perfectly salted with hints of herbs and smoke while remaining tender and juicy.
The Mud Flow is generally considered to have the best versions of the dish. They use whatever fresh fish they get from the marked in Mudvein and bring in fresh mud from the nearby forest daily. Nob Grubb, the Mud Flow's owner, claims to have a secret location in the forest that has the best mud. Only Nob and a few of his employees know the location, and they take extra care to not be followed (though that has not always been successful).
In the years since it gained popularity, the dish has been modified many times. Many varients exist, usually by adding extra ingredients like fruits, vegetables, other meats, or spices. Some cooks even go so far as to try to find a mud with an even better flavor profile. Most of these are met with mixed success at best, or downright awful at worst.

History

While no one truly knows how the dish was invented, the most commonly accepted story takes place in the years immediately following The Destruction of Nyra. It is believed that a long forgotten resident of Mudvein was cooking a fish over a campfire. While the fish was cooking , a nearby retaining wall failed, leading to the fish and the fire being covered in mud. The man, having no other food to eat and not wishing to go hungry, dug the fish out and reluctantly ate it. To his surprise, the fish was delicious. He shared the technique with the others living in town and it caught on overnight. Experimentation with the dish led to the discovery that if cooked in mud and left sealed, the fish would be preserved, potentially for months. Many theorize that Mudvein only survived The Great Famine by using this technique.

Item type

Consumable, Food / Drink

Rarity

Mud-Baked Fish is quite common in Mudvein and drops off in popularity and availability the further away from Mudvein you are. While the dish can be made with any mud, the mud pulled from The Mud Forest has certain characteristics that are impossible to recreate elsewhere. Sometimes this mud is exported to allow distant taverns to faithfully recreate the dish, usually at significant cost.

Weight

1lb

Dimensions

8"x4"

Base Price

1sp