Inn Menu

a system-agnostic inn menu generatorhow it works?

Options

Source:

How it works

Set the world on the left and press Generate. The menu is built from hand-written dishes and tagged ingredients, filtered and priced by what the dials say about the world. No AI is involved: the rules are deterministic and the data files are open.

  • Seed. The same seed with the same dials always rebuilds the same menu. New seed rerolls it, and the lock icons hold any dial (or the seed) in place while you explore.
  • Share link. Copies a URL carrying every dial and the seed, so a menu can be bookmarked, shared, or preset by an external tool.
  • Events and conditions. Events (a market day, a caravan, a feast) are one-night color that nudges the kitchen. Conditions (war, plague, siege) cut trade routes and thin the larder. The labeled notes above the menu say what is acting on the kitchen tonight.
  • Prices. Base cost times inn tier, economy, condition, event and import distance. Imported dishes are labeled and marked up; a siege seals the gates entirely.
  • Historical Mode. An optional bias toward what a kitchen in roughly 14th to 16th century Europe could serve. The info button next to it has the details.
  • Export. Copy text puts a paste-ready version on the clipboard for session notes; Print / PDF prints just the menu page.

A note about the Historical mode

Biases the generator toward what a real medieval kitchen could plausibly serve, from roughly 14th to 16th century Europe to the medieval Islamic world. Checking it:

  • Removes New World foods (potato, tomato, maize, squash, turkey) and distilled spirits; modern beer styles take their period names.
  • Drops pickled vegetables in the European regions; the arid south keeps its vinegar pickles, which are period there.
  • Rolls fish days (about 195 a year in the real calendar): no meat, and on the strict days no eggs or dairy. The arid region follows other rhythms and skips them.
  • Limits how many dishes an inn will serve. An English law of 1363 restricted how many dishes people of each rank could be served at a meal, and the menu follows that spirit.
  • Keeps bread and ale at steady prices even in bad years. Medieval law fixed their price (the "assize of bread and ale"), so hard times show up as missing food rather than expensive ale.
  • Adds period fare: verjuice, stockfish, perry, metheglin, wafers, pottages, mortrews.

Fantasy packs are disabled while this is on. It stays a game aid: the biomes are not Earth, and the written menu itself is a cheerful anachronism (the word is from 1718). Coverage is strongest for northwest Europe; the arid south now draws on the medieval Islamic culinary corpus (caravanserai and cookshop fare, mukhallalat pickles, sikanjabin syrup drinks), its dishes named as the period knew them (sikbaj, mujaddara, ma'muniyya).

Sources consulted:

  • The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England, Ian Mortimer
  • The English Alehouse, Peter Clark
  • Scents and Flavors: A Syrian Cookbook (the 13th-century Wusla), trans. Charles Perry
  • Medieval Cuisine of the Islamic World, Lilia Zaouali, trans. M.B. DeBevoise
  • Jim Chevallier, food historian, and u/iuabv of r/AskFoodHistorians, who generously pointed at sources and errors

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This is a hobby project by Alex Monge, free and open source. If you enjoyed it, let me know or send me a tip on Ko-fi.