Tea in Tairos

Tea of all varieties has been a long-consumed hot beverage by most of the cultures and races of Tairos. The earliest recorded consumption of tea comes from cave drawings found by archological teams exploring ancient sites in the Balmoran Plains. There they discovered drawings depicting the harvesting and brewing of leaves for medicinal purposes by the proto-Balmoran tribesmen.

The Skyriran Empire which followed was perhaps the first to brew team as a beverage rather than purely a medicine. It's impossible to know what manner of plants existed in the region now known as the Scorch so the exact nature of their tea is unknown. However, some surviving text do describe the tea brewed from local plants as having a strong citrus quality. Likely, as the Empire expanded it would have introduced additional foreign teas to the people.

The elves have a long history of tea consumption. The plants local to the coasts of Lake Lunarch produce very floral tastes and aromas that can be likened to Jasmine or Lavender depending the blend. The citizens of Melanthris have a tea-based beverage known as Twilight or Twilight Tea that is often consumed prior to meditation or moments of quiet. The drink is mixed with small quantities of manacite and sometimes further enhanced with minor enchanted narcotics to produce a mild-altering elixir. It produces a mild but relaxing euphoria in elves. The effect is more pronounced in non-elves and often leads to a more unpleasant or frightening experience. That said, many non-elven magic users seem able to better process the additives and enjoy the altered state of mind that elves experience.

for the Gnomes , much like the rest of their cultural identity, the tea drinking habits of their people is lost. The gnomes of Homestead do regularly consume and enjoy the tea varieties from Ghal Pelor however.

Dwarves have little interest in tea as Ghal Ankhar produces few plants and none well-suited for tea making. There are some mushrooms, moss, and lichen that have been brewed in a similar fashion to tea but the taste is generally bitter, earthy, and all together unpleasant. A tea-like concoction made from a variety of fungal ingredients along with a small amount of ale or beer is commonly used to bottle-feed newborn dwarves. The mixture is called Maurhadha which roughly translates to mash or pulp water. It is very nutriotious and has something of a following among midwifes, nurses, and similar professions in Ghal Pelor where the drink can sell for prices similar to bottles of good quality wine. Getting a baby to willingly drink it is another matter and often requires a considerable quantity of honey or sugar water to be added. Something a Ghal Ankharan would laugh at.

Halflings have a long history of mixing existing blends or tweaking the recipes they've come across to create unique new teas. Many of the most stringent and haughty of tea connisurs look down on this practice and condemn Halflings tea as something of a bastardization that ruins the authenticity of the tea drinking experience. However; halfling blends are by far the most commonly enjoyed non-medicinal tea consumed in Ghal Pelor and Homestead. The flavors tend to be the most enjoyable for casual drinkings of all kind. This has made halfling tea easily the most common variety packaged and sold in general stores throughout Tairos.

Tengu don't seem to have a tea unique to their culture nor do that enjoy it. Tengu have an aversion to hot drinks in general as their lack of lips make sipping hot fluid impossible. The closest approximation to tea that Tengu enjoy are herbal baths. The blends are very similar to tea blends but often cut with salts, minerals, moisturizers and other skin/feather soothing additives and heated in a large tub that the Tengu can soak in for a while. The leftover bath water is often referred to as "Tengu Tea" by non-Tengu. There's a history of drunken wagers by visitors to Tengu Town daring each other to have a hot cup of Tengu Tea.

The Fae seemed to greatly enjoy the teas of Tairos. Whatever tea they themselves arrived with were certainly not native to their homeworld but likely collected from across their travels elsewhere. Whatever the manner they almost always sweetened the drink heavily with honey, sugar, agave from the Scorch, or chocolate. In fact, chocolate teas became a very popular drink prior to the Queen's War. Versions of the drink were appearing in taverns, tea houses, and in prepackaged forms inside general stores across all of Tairos. It was one of many such products meant to attract fae patrons. During the war the drink immediately fell out of favor with non-fae. The exception was inside Melanthris where the blend maintained a minor popularity even during the height of the war with the fae and after. Today, the obscure recipes used back then are starting to make a comeback in Ghal Pelor and even Frial.

Item type

Consumable, Food / Drink