There are a few things one might expect Highland to have due to its similarities to medieval England but which it doesn’t, and some things it does have that might not be expected.
What’s different?: Animals
Highland has no donkeys, and thus also no mules. People generally make do with horses and oxen for carrying heavy loads.
Highland also has no domesticated cats. It does have dogs of various species, and wild cats (bobcat and cougar) are relatively common.
What’s different?: Food
Highland has no American corn, as expected. The term “corn” is used, as is normal for this time period, for the dominant grain. Usually this will be wheat. Rice is grown in some areas of South Bend.
On the other hand, Highland does have potatoes, and South Bend has tomatoes.
For oils, besides butter and lard they use flaxseed oil. In the east they also press oil from camelina (gold of pleasure, for gold oil) and in the west from sunflower seeds.
What’s different?: Tobacco
Tobacco is available, though rare, and comes from Erventon. Called northweed, its use was limited to the northern villages of West Highland until the Goblin Wars. It is still rare enough, but its use has spread to some of the southern towns. Adherents argue over the merits of Weaving Weed and Fartown Leaf, the two sources of northweed in Christian Highland.
Tobacco has spread by way of Pirate’s Cove to Crosspoint. When one talks of the “smoke-filled bars of Crosspoint”, it is a specific kind of bar that is being discussed: one where you keep an eye on your money and a hand on your dagger.
Alcoholic Beverages
Beer, ale, and wine are the main alcoholic beverages in Highland. The Celts distill uisge beatha for ceremonial purposes, and some of this whiskey makes it to Crosspoint via Pirate’s Cove. Whiskey ranges from 40% to 50% alcohol.
Some backwoods farmers on the High Road will freeze hard cider during the coldest months of the year, and “distill” what they call Druid Cider (and what the rest of the world calls High Cider) by removing the ice. High Cider is generally 30% to 40% alcohol.
South Bend and Great Bend, great exporters of wine, also export dragon’s breath, a beverage distilled from wine. It is what we would call brandy and is 40% to 60% alcohol. Dragon’s breath (also called feu du serpent among the Franks) is made generally for export, as it travels better than wine. Dragon’s breath is also added to wine, bringing the wine up to 18% to 30% alcohol by volume, making the wine travel better. Most of the wine exported north from the Bend is this export or port wine. Because of the relative ease of transport, the higher concentration ports are typically less expensive, and sold in less reputable areas, than the ports whose concentrations approach that of normal wine.
While some port (and dragon’s fire) is beginning to make its way into West Highland, most of this goes to Black Stag.
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