Herald of Steel

These main dishes that Mean described would all have some garden produce accompanying them, such as artichokes, beans, asparagus, beets, onions, etc, either roasted, salted, or prepared in some other way.

“After the main course, is the deserts.” Mean listed the third and last course.

And the menu was simple beyond belief, as Mean pronounced, “It’s just fruit such as grapes, apples, pears, plums, etc. And it’s customary to give various nuts, hazelnuts, almonds, walnuts, and pistachios as a gift to take home.”

That was it.

Adhanian food customs did not really have much in the way of desserts, and even their wedding cake was more like a bread mixture.

‘Well that will need to change.’ Alexander decisively determined about the desserts.

He could not believe that the Adhanian had invented the ice room, but did not have the time to invent some kind of dessert using it.

All they would do was use the ice as a kind of topping to cool their wine.

While in Alexander’s timeline, some sources describe ice cream-like foods as originating in Persia as far back as 550 BC, where using ice houses and ice pools, Persians were able to serve and produce faloodeh (a type of fruit custard made from rice or flour) and sorbets (fruit juice/ shake) all year round.

And lastly there were the drinks portions that Mean left implied.

A variety of options would be available such as apple and pear cider, cordials from aromatic plants, fermented honey and water, and of course, wine, which was also the most popular.

Though that one was always drunk diluted to make sure one remained sober and did not make sure the party was rowdy, for that would be a large breach of etiquette.

Listening to Mean’s list of courses, Alexander found it not to his taste and almost snobbishly said, “I’m not satisfied with any of the items on the menu. So, in the following week, I will teach the cooks here the dishes I want for the wedding.”

Mean kept a placid face to this declaration and nodded understandingly, though commented in her heart, ‘There he goes all acting high and mighty!’

A tiny little pet peeve of hers and Cambyses was that Alexander would many times act unimpressed or even express disdain over things the girls would find quite attractive.

Things like good food, housing, bedding, etc.

And they thought Alexander was just hard to please.

While the real reason was that he had much better expectations and also because the things that were new for the girls, were not new for him.

But Mean kept these thoughts to herself, and decided to escort Alexander into the kitchen, teasingly saying, “Well, let’s go inside and meet the cooks you will be teaching.”

Alexander found all the staff standing in front of the kitchen door ready to greet him, and cheered in a chorus, “Welcome my lord.”

These men and women all wore hairnets and white overall with a name tag attached to their chest, as asked by Alexander, looking almost like surgeons.

Alexander nodded lightly to the greeting, as Mean invited him inside and gave him a tour of the interior.

It was a very large complex, with multiple chimneys and large windows, its floor paved with cement and its walls made of wood.

“Here are the hearths and stove,” She introduced as Alexander walked past the roaring fireplaces being manned by women and being constantly fed firewood, cooking the liquids inside the many large and small pots.

“And there is the ‘pizza oven’ you asked for,” Mean showed a bit further into the tour.

It was a semicircular stove with fire raging inside, a stove found all over Adhnaia typically used to bake flatbread.

And pizza was that- a flatbread with cheese, meat, and other vegetables as toppings.

Alexander nodded in satisfaction at the construction, as he then checked the area around the stoves for dirt and unclean hygiene practices.

And was reassured to find none.

“As you requested, I have instructed that all the cooks must wash their hands with soap before handling the ingredients. And they must pay particular attention to clean their hands after cutting meat and fish,” Mean diligently further reported.

“Good. Unclean hands make us sick,” Alexander reminded.

Mean then continued her report, “I have also compiled a list of common infractions and the punishments they carry as you asked. It is hung there.”

Mean pointed to a large board placed prominently at the center of the kitchen, which was covered with a large sheet of paper.

Alexander walked over there to read the contents of the paper, and it included the types of mistakes commonly made and the punishment associated with them.

For example, Spilling food mistakenly was marked as getting scolded.

Breaking pots was punished by skipping a meal.

Unclean hands were punished by fines.

And much more, with the list appearing exhaustive.

“How did you make the list?” Alexander asked curiously as he read through the list, and Mean answered, “I asked each of the staff one large mistake they did and how they were punished. That’s it,”

“Clever,” Alexander nodded approvingly.

Alexander was satisfied with the hygiene of the cooking area, as he then asked, “Could I see where the pots, pans, and utensils are stored? I want to see if they are properly cleaned?”

“Sure, we store them over on the rack there,” Mean pointed at a part of the kitchen and soon took Alexander there.

There on wooden racks there were rows and rows of pots and pans of all sizes, made of earth and stored with their mouth flipped down.

Alexander randomly took picked a few and inspected them for any sign of grime and dirt, and noticed none.

But as Alexander was putting them back, he remarked how heavy they were and how convenient it would be to have them made of iron.

‘Iron! I should get to starting to pottery shop!’ Alexander in his busy schedule had forgotten that he had an excess supply of iron.

In his mind, he thought he would sell the raw, impure ingots as is.

“Mean, what do you think of making all these pots and pans out of iron? And those utensils too!” Alexander asked while pointing to all the wooden spoons and ladles hung on the side of the rack to dry.

‘Huh? Is there enough iron in the world, Alex?’ Mean looked at Alexander incredulously, thinking he might be overworking himself.

Because in this time period, iron was a somewhat precious material, and so to Mean it sounded the same as Alexander wondering if he could make the potteries out of gold or silver.

Fun fact, even the last thought was not an impossibility if one thought about the Aztecs and Mayans, whose civilization thrived due to the presence of gold as they had not mastered metal-working, though it was that same metal that drew the greed of the Europeans and destroyed them. ．𝚌ｏｍ

“Don’t you know about the iron furnace? We can make a lot of iron now!” Alexander also asked a bit surprised, a bit shocked that Mean did not know about this monumental creation.

“I work in the house. And I know what happens inside the house. How would I know what happens outside?” Mean put her hands on her hips and flared up her nose as she chided Alexander.

And this made Alexander comment, “Fair point.”

To Mean what the servants whispered was more important than what happened to the city outside.

And this made Alexander again aware that without the printing press, it was very hard for news to spread amongst the populace as evidenced by even someone as privileged as Mean had missed such a huge piece of news.

Whereas if there was a newspaper, which new invention would have been headline news for at least a month.

‘Tsk, I really should get to making one,’ Alexander again promised himself but found his schedule relatively packed until his wedding about a week and a half from now on.

For within this time period, he had to inspect the wedding venue, oversee its decoration, plan how to showcase the various new products to the people attending them, inspect the coal briquettes plant, visit the cement plant, and the latest thing to be added to his itinerary, teaching the cooks here the new dishes to be served in the wedding.

But for now, Alexander put these scheduled visits out of his mind and instead focused on Mean.

“We have invented a way to make iron cheaply and in very large quantities. So I was thinking of setting up an iron pottery and utensils shop. And I wanted you to oversee it,” Alexander offered Mean another job.

He was sure the shop he was about to set up was extremely lucrative.

Because making pottery was like the tech industry of the ancient world- it was where all the money was.

This might sound a bit strange as potters and vase makers were not the wealthiest artisans, but

people needed pottery for all kinds of things- from cooking pots to drinking, to storage jars, to decorating one’s household.

And although each individual piece only earned a tiny profit, it was the sheer volume that counted.

So, with Alexander being able to offer pottery made of iron at competitive prices of earthen wear, Alexander was confident about undercutting the earthen pottery industry.

After all, who would want to buy an earthen pot which was heavier than its iron counterpart due to it being thicker, and could break easily, when a perfectly better alternative existed?