Don’t Drink the Fairy Wine - Spirits X Wine Enthusiast
/We teamed up with the folks at the Wine Enthusiast Podcast to chat about all things fairy wine, fairy food, the trope of “don’t eat the fairy food”, as well as how the tropes are being utilized in modern fantasy and romantasy! Grab a glass of wine (that didn’t appear in the middle of a ring of mushrooms, please!) and dive in with us.
Content Warning: This episode contains conversations about or mentions of blood, kidnapping, death, sexual content, implied cannibalism, violence, and death.
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Cast & Crew
- Co-Hosts: Julia Schifini and Amanda McLoughlin
- Editor: Bren Frederick
- Music: Brandon Grugle, based on "Danger Storm" by Kevin MacLeod
- Artwork: Allyson Wakeman
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About Us
Spirits is a boozy podcast about mythology, legends, and folklore. Every episode, co-hosts Julia and Amanda mix a drink and discuss a new story or character from a wide range of places, eras, and cultures. Learn brand-new stories and enjoy retellings of your favorite myths, served over ice every week, on Spirits.
Transcript
JULIA: Hey, ConSpiriters, Julia here. We have a fun episode for you this week. We sat down with our friends over at Wine Enthusiast to talk about fairy wine, fairy food, the origins of these stories, and how they're being used in modern romantacy. We had an absolute blast recording this, and we think you'll be interested to know that "don't eat the fairy food" has some really fascinating origins. So sit back and enjoy this episode.
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JORDON: Hello, and welcome to the Wine Enthusiast Podcast, your serving of drinks, culture, and the people who drive it. I'm Jordon Kaplan, managing editor here at Wine Enthusiast. Today's episode is the stuff of fairy tales because it is quite literally about fairies, with all of the hype surrounding the highly anticipated book six of the A Court of Thorns and Roses series slated for October. I asked Spirits Podcast co-hosts Julia and Amanda, the boozy supernatural experts, back over to the pod to discuss the where, the why, and the what realm of fairy food and wine, a tempting treat to lure unsuspecting humans, or a simple offering. You decide. Amanda, Julia, I am so excited to have you guys on today to talk about a topic that I am very, very interested in. And welcome.
JULIA: I— we're really excited to be here. Anytime I hear fairy lore, I am already stoked.
AMANDA: Same.
JORDON: And incidentally, we're recording this on May 1st, which is a huge day in fairy lore. So happy summer solstice, beltane, whatever you guys want— might wanna call it today. So this is a great frame, background for our conversation.
JULIA: Very exciting.
AMANDA: Happy International Labor Day, Happy Workers' Rights.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: It's a beautiful day to be talking about wine and food and how we enjoy it together.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: Yeah. Let's get into that. So fairy wine and food is one of those things, it's like enchanting when you're reading about it, when it's depicted on screen, and it always looks like either the thing that you dream that you want to have at your dinner party or the thing that you would never touch with a 10-foot pole. But fairy lore in general, I think, has been so ingratiated into the modern zeitgeist, much to do with the Sarah J. Maas of it all. And as we all know, we're getting, I believe, two ACOTAR books at the end of the year and one shortly thereafter. So no titles to those as of yet, but I know everybody in the fandom is really anticipating those releases and some of her best plot mechanisms and her plot usage goes with fairy food and fairy wine. And I'm so interested in the or— origins of these things and these motifs and these myths. And as a certified fairy gal, since I could read, I can't wait to dive into it. So I'm interested from you guys, what are some of the origins of some of this, like, Fae myth in its— in total?
JULIA: Yeah, I think that's a great question. One of the things that you are going to see— a lot of fairy lore comes from oral tradition. So it's a little bit hard for us to sort of track down exactly where and when a lot of these stories come from. When we're talking about— especially in our sort of, like, ACOTAR modern usage of fairy food and fairy wine, one of the things that we see a lot as a trope is the don't eat the Fae food, right?
JORDON: Uh-hmm.
JULIA: And so, like, if you have never heard of that before, if you're like, "What are you even talking about?" That is basically like a trope of when you are in another world, whether that is the Fae realm, the spirit world, any, like, other dimension of any kind besides the mortal world. You should not eat or drink any food or drink while you're there because it will lead to something bad. Sometimes that means you are trapped there forever. Sometimes it means you've been put under the control of a person who fed you, sometimes it means you get turned into another creature or another form. And sometimes it just, like, tastes bad, or it tastes so good that it ruins normal food for you forever.
JORDON: Uh-hmm.
JULIA: But there is always— it comes with this warning of don't eat the Fae food.
AMANDA: And under that is some of the kind of fear or warning that things can be a little bit too good, a little bit not as good as they seem. And one of the favorite parts for me about these Fae myth is that you can't really trust your own senses. And so you might smell or see something delicious when actually it's rotten underneath, like Julia mentioned, something we see in Holly Black Books, for example. Or maybe, as you mentioned, you lose inhibition and not just the, "I had a couple glasses of wine and I feel more likely to dance to Shania Twain than I otherwise would." But like, "No, I'm going to dance all night until my feet are bloody." And the sort of idea that a glass of wine is not just a glass of wine, that a platter of fruit is not just a platter of fruit, is often one of our first introductions in fiction into the idea that things are not quite what they seem.
JULIA: Hmm.
JORDON: Uh-hmm. And I mean, keeping them in the world is almost the entire driver of the plot. I mean, in ACOTAR, I think the first book is set up, Feyre is served that wine to, like, endure her prison sentence under the mountain. Sorry, spoiler alert for anyone who's on the first book, but you guys gotta read the first book before—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: —listening to the fairy podcast. And that is, you know, the introduction to a major character that plays a huge role in the subsequent books. And she— and that is his offering to her to dull her senses.
JULIA: Yes, and like the way that they use it as well, there too is this idea of, as Amanda pointed out, like the lowering of inhibitions to a almost supernatural state. And so being able to erase these terrible memories is said— is somewhat of a blessing in the case of Feyre, but in the case of the other mortals that are being manipulated or used by the fairy folk, it is a lot more malicious. And I don't know if I want to jump to this right away, but the reason behind that, in terms of the lore in general and also the way that it is utilized by modern authors is a really interesting twist on a traditional trope that we see in mythology and just, like, ancient religions as a whole, which is the idea of sacred hospitality. So I could talk a little bit more about that later if we want to.
JORDON: I can't wait to get into that. And— yeah. And so certainly Sarah J. Maas has popularized fairies in, like, the last, let's call it, 10 years. But there's been fairy books and fairy stories for a long time that may not have been considered romantasy. But—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: —some of the other big authors, you mentioned Holly Black, that's— she's one of my favorites. She depicts the fairies much more— it's hard to say that she's more true to actual fairy lore, because that seems silly to say, because it's fairy myth and lore. But her fairies are much more on the grotesque and the so ugly, they're beautiful, their blue skin, green skin. And I think a lot of what she uses her fairy wine for is most of it, I guess, in ACOTAR too, is that malevolence. But I think she depicts it as this, like, sparkling green-looking mixture that, you know, keeps you there trapped forever. Whereas I see a lot of them portrayed as, like, meads or a summer wine or heavily spiced and some of it is disgusting. So do you guys have any idea where we get some of these— where we draw some of these depictions of these different types of drinks from?
JULIA: Yeah. So that's really interesting. We've had a lot of association of drinks and foods that are related to the gods that are not meant for mortals. So you get that as early as ambrosia from the ancient Greeks, which is, like, sometimes food, sometimes drink, depends on which poet is talking about it. That is what supposedly gave the gods their longevity or immortality. And it was typically served at these heavenly feasts that were hosted by the gods on Mount Olympus. It was actually said to have been named after the nymph that nursed Dionysus in his infancy. And if you want to hear more about Dionysus and sacred wine, you can listen to the other episode that we did with you guys. But it's a fascinating— like that nymph was named Ambrosia, and then they named this sort of, like, mythical drink or food after her, which is kind of great. And it was also said that, like, it was so purifying that the goddess Hera, who is the goddess of marriage and the wife of Zeus, who is the king of the gods, she would use it to cleanse the defilement of her lovely flesh. So essentially she would bathe in it and it would turn her back into a virgin.
JORDON: Interesting.
JULIA: Uh-hmm. Uh-hmm.
JORDON: My only— the only thing I know about her is that she's incredibly jealous. So I thought it was—
JULIA: Yes.
JORDON: —leading to that, but I had never heard that part of it before.
JULIA: Yeah. Well, I mean, she's incredibly jealous because her husband is going about and doing a lot of things that would make any person jealous normally. We're Hera stans on the podcast. We're like, "Understandable."
AMANDA: We support women's rights and wrongs. And I think there is no such thing as wrong when Zeus is your husband.
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: But as you mentioned, there are also so many great examples in literature, in the kind of modern usage of this being a little bit unnerving, a little bit not of human origin. And so as you mentioned, Holly Black has a kind of, like, green with gold flecks, giving kind of Mary Sue eyes, if anyone else has been writing fanfiction with, like, lavender green and gold eyes. But the idea is that this is really drawing from, like, the herbal, from the bitter, from the things that can be bad for you or might mask other tastes. And so specifically, I think there are notes of, like, herbal taste. It's a little bit light in Holly Black's Folk of the Air series and seems refreshing, but there's actually a lot more to it. And you almost can't notice the effects that the beverage is having on you because it is— like I said, wine is a little bit more than wine. And I think particularly when we get to this idea of going into something a little bit unknowing, taking a sip without knowing what you're committing to, accepting someone's hospitality, per Julia, or taking something that you know is not quite for you, will kind of give more consequences down the line. And I really love that in Holly Black's more kind of, like, dark or forbidden or, like, supernatural and sort of consequential magic. Folks don't look like exactly what they are. And that applies to the food and drink as well.
JULIA: I also think that's really interesting too, Amanda, kind of tying that into this idea— a lot of these authors who are telling more modern versions of these fairy tales, for lack of a better phrase, they are sort of doing it medieval core, medieval adjacent, right?
JORDON: Uh-hmm.
JULIA: And so there is this, like, kind of true, kind of misinterpreted idea of like, "Oh, the peasants like—" what's the phrase online where it's like, "A Dorito would kill a medieval surf."
AMANDA: Yes.
JULIA: It's kind of like that idea of, like, the food is so spiced. It is so out of the domain of what a typical person would eat, a mortal person of the mortal realm would eat, that it is so enticing in a way that is almost unfathomable to the main characters who are being introduced to this fairy food.
AMANDA: Julia, you're so right. You're reminding me too of, like, fruit that smells so delicious, it's a little bit rotten, right? That, like—
JULIA: Oh, yeah.
AMANDA: —looks beautiful. And then you get up to it and there's like a whiff of something else underneath. It is like inhumanly complex and containing like sunshine and moonlight, you know, all at once. Like incredibly sweet, incredibly bitter, and more than mortal minds could possibly comprehend.
JULIA: Holly Black, I think, has the ever apple or the fairy fruit, right? Like that kind of falls under that category.
AMANDA: Exactly.
JORDON: Uh-hmm. And I think the wine and the effects it's— it has on the actual Fae folk is very minimal to almost none in a lot of depictions, but it's the humans that are completely consumed by it, but everyone is drinking it. I wonder if there is any sort of— I don't— usually it says there's almost no effect on the actual Fae people.
JULIA: Uh-hmm. I— or it would be the same effect as us drinking normal wine normally, you know what I mean? And I think that kind of does hearken back to these like godlike substances that are meant solely for the gods. And if a human were to drink them or eat them, it usually does not end well for them. So I think that is fascinating.
AMANDA: What a call to adventure, right? If we think about, like, Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey, something we refer to very often over on Spirits, it is saying to somebody, "I don't think you're ready for this." And the protagonist gets to say, "Yes, I am."
JULIA: Hmm.
AMANDA: And whether they correctly assess their, you know, willingness to get into the adventure, to take a sip of the beverage, to, like, take the shot they probably shouldn't take, but they're feeling it in the night and they do it anyway. It's a really wonderful kind of metaphor and maybe an aperitif for a bigger adventure of saying, "Well, these problems aren't mine. I wasn't made for this world. I wasn't made for this journey. But you know what? I'm gonna opt into it anyway."
JULIA: Hmm.
JORDON: Which, I mean, sounds not unlike the choice to have that last vodka soda at the end of the night, you know?
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: For me, it's the espresso martini. If I'm considering an espresso martini, it's probably time to go home.
JORDON: No, you're about to get transported into another world.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: Yes.
JORDON: So we talked a little bit about the mythology, but a lot of these motifs seem to hearken back to, you know, Persephone and eating the fruit, and then even the forbidden fruit from the Bible. You know, these things that are— you ingest and so they become part of you and you become part of the world and then you're still trapped there. I know you guys wanted to talk about that sort of forbidden hospitality and I think maybe this would be a great place to get into that. especially when you consider roots and stories like— and myths like Persephone and Dionysus and Hera.
JULIA: Yes. So let's talk about— there's a couple of examples. I think this is really interesting because I think a lot of the fairy lore around not eating food comes from that, like, sort of pre-existing mythology. So the fairy— I can get into more of, like, where our fairy lore specifically comes from, where it, like, explicitly says, "Hey, don't eat that fairy food." It's much later than you probably would think. However, a lot of those stories probably come from pre-existing mythologies that predates there. And what's interesting, too, is there are a lot of stories that kind of come from across the world that deal with this, "If you eat food not of your realm, there are consequences to that." So famously, the Persephone and Hades story, Persephone is the Greek goddess of flowers in spring. She is kidnapped from the surface world by the god of the dead, Hades. And then when this is discovered, the king of the god, Zeus, demands that Hades return Persephone back to her mother, who is the earth goddess, Demeter. Now, Hades has already married Persephone by the time they figured out what has happened. And so has— and so as part of that marriage ceremony, or knowing that she is about to leave, has her eat several pomegranate seeds while in the underworld, which as a result, because she ate that food of the underworld, she is obligated to return to the underworld for either half the year or three months, kind of depending on which story you're reading and the amount of seeds that she ate. And so this is a story that sort of explains for the ancient Greeks why the seasons happen, but it does set this precedent of not eating food from the underworld. There's also like several other stories in Greek mythology that feature like, "Don't eat this food or something bad is going to happen to you." For example, in The Odyssey, which shout out, we have that Odyssey movie coming out next year. Odysseus and his men land on an island that is occupied by this sorcerer Circe, who offers them up a feast to Odysseus and his crew. Odysseus is the only one who does not eat the food, spurning Circe's hospitality, but the rest who do eat the food are turned into pigs.
AMANDA: Better to be impolite and alive than full and a literal pig.
JULIA: So that is, like, a really interesting aspect of that. That's falling into that sacred hospitality, which I'll talk a little bit more about. But it's like very, very interesting that you're like, "How do I find a polite way to tell my host, hey, I can't eat your food because I think you're gonna turn me into a pig?"
AMANDA: Which is interesting when you remember Odysseus is a king and poison testers, the poisoning of kings is rife through the Odyssey, not to mention just history, that a gift is not always a gift and it might have a dagger hidden inside of it.
JORDON: Hmm.
JULIA: Exactly.
JORDON: I was just considering, I did not remember that part of the Odyssey because it's been a little bit since I've read it and/or watched any of it. But I'm like, is Spirited Away the telling of the Odyssey? That's exactly what happens to her.
JULIA: Yes.
JORDON: Uh-hmm.
JULIA: The really, like, kind of messed up part about that story, too, is she then, like, holds Odysseus there for, like, 10 years and it's like very heavily implied that they are eating pork throughout those 10 years. So he might be—
AMANDA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: Yeah.
JULIA: —eating his own crewmates.
JORDON: Hmm.
JULIA: Who can say?
JORDON: Uh-hmm. So how does some of that retelling bring us into some of the— or I— there might be some stopovers on the way, but how do we get to this modern retelling of some of these motifs?
JULIA: Absolutely. So jumping from ancient Greece, another really good kind of earlier example before we get into the explicit fairy lore, is from a medieval Danish history. It's called Gesta Danorum, which is from the 12th century. And it features a lot of, like, Norse mythology that is sort of put into combination with these semi-legendary stories of Danish history. And in this, while passing through the realm of giants, there is a hero named Thorkell who warns his companions that if they were to eat any of the food that is offered to them by the giant Goodmund, [18:48] they will lose their memories and never leave the realm of the giants again. So you're seeing kind of, like, patterns here that are leading to our fairy lore. And so later on, they are invited to this banquet by the giant, and the hero, much like Odysseus, has to use his cunning to make polite excuses as to why he and his men refuse to eat at the table of their host.
JORDON: You know, as you're saying— as you're— as we're talking about these different cultures, I— I'm reflective on the fact that as— Sarah J. Maas, all of her characters are pulled— they're named from after Greek goddesses, after Norse mythology.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: Egyptian. It's—
JULIA: You have some Celtic in there as well. There's—
JORDON: Yeah.
JULIA: —explicitly a character named the Morrigan in the series.
AMANDA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: Right. Which the Morgan is— she was— she's like a war fairy. Is that right?
JULIA: Sort of war and death goddess. She's a triple—
JORDON: Right.
JULIA: —goddess, so she's associated with several different forms. It's a really, like, more of a character that is associated with life and death, and death on the battlefield, but also being able to heal from that.
JORDON: So Sarah is really— I mean, not even just— she's drawing from a lot of different places. So this truly— her iteration is, like, almost the— is that the— I guess it would be the amalgam of all of these different threads.
JULIA: Uh-hmm. Yeah. The girly loves mythology. Reading those books, I was like, "Oh, I see where that's from. Oop, I see where that's from."
JORDON: And also, you know, sometimes a lot of the fan predictions, too, draw from how they've been named and what—
JULIA: Yeah.
JORDON: —she thinks— what people think that she will end up doing with those characters.
JULIA: Uh-hmm. I'm very curious because I very much read those books in isolation, not, like, engaging with the fandom too much, besides my two friends who also read the books. And so it is very funny to be like, "And people are, like, suspecting that this is the case." I'm like, "Oh! Okay, cool. That's good to know."
JORDON: I'm like, "You guys are writing the book for her."
JULIA: Yeah.
JORDON: I mean, I'll just come on the form, you know.
JULIA: Precisely. So jumping from that sort of medieval source here, we get into these Fae stories that are coming out of, like, England and Ireland and Scotland. And, like, I sort of mentioned earlier, origins for Fae myth are complicated because a lot of them are oral traditions. So it makes it really hard to sort of nail down which stories came first, which ones are later creations, which ones are sort of, like, made up whole cloth. Now, from what I've been able to find in, like, researching this, we have probably two stories that are the earliest explicitly documented stories where the characters are told outright, "Don't eat the fairy food or something will happen." One of the earliest written examples of that is The Child Roland, which is a story that was first published in 1814, if you could believe how, like—
JORDON: Wow.
JULIA: —recent that is, I suppose. And then was popularized by Joseph Jacobs book, The English Fairy Tales, which was published in 1819. So the original version, this, like, 1814 version that was published by Robert Jameson, he claimed that it was originally based on a Scottish ballad that predated the writing. So, again, this oral tradition that people are finally, like, sitting down and writing down. So in The Child Roland, a boy essentially travels to Elfland to try to rescue his sister, who has been taken there. He is warned by, of all people, Merlin from Arthurian legend.
JORDON: Oh!
AMANDA: Merlin gets his way into so many things.
JULIA: Yeah.
JORDON: I don't know.
JULIA: He really does.
JORDON: You'd never think you see Merlin in so many places.
JULIA: Yeah, you wouldn't guess, and yet here he is. So he is warned by Merlin to, "Chop off the head of anyone in Elfland who speaks to him until he sees his sister, and that he must not eat or drink anything while in the realm." Our protagonist forgets all of that, is offered classically. Classically, we're forgetting the warnings that are given to us by people. So he is offered food from his sister who is in Elfland, who is herself sort of enchanted or possessed, but then remembers the advice from Merlin at the very last minute and therefore is not enchanted by the food. And so the explicit warning that Merlin gives him in The Child Roland text is, "And what you've not to do is this: Bite no bite and drink no drink." Sorry. "Bite no bite and drink no drop, however hungry or thirsty you be. Drink a drop or bite a bite while in Elfland you be, and never will you see Middle Earth again."
JORDON: Hmm.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: I mean, I can see how he would have forgot such an intricate warning.
JULIA: Yeah, it's like very— I mean, a little long winded by Merlin, certainly.
JORDON: Right.
AMANDA: Not known for his brevity, Merlin.
JULIA: But not known for his brevity.
AMANDA: He shows up and pontificates.
JULIA: So another, like, super fascinating story, somewhat from around that time period and from the same area, is a story that is from Hertfordshire, which is known as the Green Lady. So this is gonna— if you are familiar with fairy tales at all, this is a fairy tale structure that is often used in a lot of fairy tales. It's essentially, like, the youngest of three daughters is good and pure. Her older sisters are not good. She goes out into the world to seek her fortune or to, like, help her family, like, raise money or whatever. And because she is so good and so pure, she is given a sort of, like, advice before she gets herself into a situation. So in this case, she, like, shares some bread and some wine with this older gentleman that she comes across while she is out to "make her fortunes." And he gives her advice, being like, "There's a woman down the road, she's a fairy lady, the green lady. You can go and work for her and she will, like, reward you handsomely as long as you are a good and hard worker. Just the only thing is you have to go and draw from this well." And she goes, "Okay." She goes to the fairy lady. The fairy lady brings her on as a servant and then sends her out to this well. And while she is at the well, she keeps drawing up these, like, individual fish from the well. So it starts with, like, a gold one, a silver one, a bronze one. And she, like, treats the fish very well. And so the fish are like, "Just a heads up, you can't eat or drink any food that the green lady offers you." And she's like, "Cool, good to know." There's this whole, like, story arc—
AMANDA: "Fish are talking to me. This is normal."
JULIA: " Fish are talking to me. It's fine. It's a fairy tale." So she basically gets sent away at the end of the tale because she spies on the green lady. And the green lady is seen dancing with a boogie, which is essentially, like, a goblin-like figure, right? And so she's like, "Well, you were a good servant, you defied my orders, but you did a good job. So I'm sending you off with a bunch of riches." She gets home. Her one sister sees how well she did seeking out her fortunes, and so also goes to the green lady's house, eats the food there. What happens is the green lady then blinds her and she is given nothing and it's tossed out into the forest where she wanders day and night until she dies, and her family has no idea what happened to her.
JORDON: Oh. That's the fish.
JULIA: Exactly. They— well, they don't know about the fish. She was too nice to the fish. So it is, like, one of those things where it's like, okay, so explicitly we are being told once again, do not eat the food that these fairy folk are offering to you because bad things will happen.
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JULIA: Hey, it's Julia, and welcome to the refill. We're gonna start by thanking our newest patrons, Maya, Annabelle, and Reese. [26:47] You join the ranks of our supporting producer-level patrons like Uhleeseeuh, Hannah, Scott, Anne, Matthew, Lily, and Wil. And of course, our legend-level patrons, Captain Jonathan MAL-uh-kye Cosmos, Audra, Sarah, Bea Me Up Scotty, Morgan, Rikoelike, Chibi Yokai, and Smallov. [27:02] And hey, you too can join our Patreon by going to patreon.com/spiritspodcast, where you can get ad-free episodes, bonus urban legends episodes, recipe cards for every single episode, and so much more. And hey, you can take advantage of our seven-day free trial as well. So head over to patreon.com/spiritspodcast. I'd also like to tell you about another podcast here at Multitude, and that is American Medieval. American Medieval is a podcast all about the Middle Ages, but with an American twist. Every week, Professor Matthew Gabriele is joined by an expert scholar to talk about either some bit of the medieval world itself or how Americans have, throughout our history, used the Middle Ages to say something about ourselves. If America has never been fully modern, it might be because we've always been a little bit medieval. Check out American Medieval for more, and new episodes are available every Wednesday. You can look for them wherever fine podcasts can be found.
JULIA: And now, let's get back to the show.
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JORDON: Amanda, I'm curious, we've just heard of a lot of good examples. What are some of the, like, literary mechanisms and, like, plot devices are being used and a lot of the— I mean, obviously, I think we're all getting the message that you should not eat anything that anyone gives you, but what kind of plot device are we sort of seeing in a lot of these different stories?
AMANDA: I think one great example that we already touched on a bit is the sort of too good to be true mirage nature of some of these items. And often that is our introduction to a new setting or new world, and really the idea of the uncanny, which is something that shows up in a lot of fantasy, sci-fi, things where we're you know inventing new worlds. That's something I really love about the romantasy trope is— it is set in a world similar to ours, but a little bit elevated. And so we will often see this as the sort of first sign for protagonists that something is not quite right. And also the start or the, I guess, example of different kinds of morality and justice, because it's not really right as we live in our mortal worlds, that we would enter into a deal, for example, without having very clear idea of the terms. If I do a favor for you and then later I say, "Well, because I did that favor for you, you have to do something for me." You'd be like, "Hmm, that's not cool. That's a little bit extortionate, a little bit rude. That's not how we do things around here. We'd try to have a fair exchange of value." But in the fairy world, whether it's because you are a mortal entering the space where no one's explained the rules to you, or if more commonly, the fair folk and the Fae are cunning, are wily, are trying to get something over on you or tricksters, you are kind of failing a test by not assuming a underhanded motive to the people that show you hospitality and kindness on their faces. And to Julia, I didn't actually run this by you, but I did a little bit of reading this morning, as you do, about the biography of W.B. Yeats. So just after the fairy stories that you're talking about published in England, this son of English colonists who grew up rich and Protestant in Ireland, W. B. Yeats, made friends with a landholder of the landed Irish gentry named Lady Augusta Gregory. And the two of them, especially as Yeats got a little bit later in life, a little bit odd, a little bit thinking about death and how he might be able to beat it, talking and thinking a lot about Fae and the fairies that "the Irish peasantry liked to talk about so much." And so Yeats and Lady Gregory wrote a book that they claimed were, like, transcribed versions of oral fairy tales that they heard among the Irish peasants.
JULIA: Hmm.
AMANDA: Again, they were English Protestants living in Ireland. So how true these sort of, you know, Irish tales were, I'm not quite sure. But this is also a place, the fairy folk tales of Ireland, where we see a lot of examples of not drinking and eating the food or the wine. There's one story I really enjoy, and you can read these on Project Gutenberg. It's very exciting. That a man, kind of like a, you know, bumbling Irish peasant, like, walks into his house and he sees a dinner laid on his table. It says, "There's no tablecloth to be sure, but what the matter? It was not always Jack had one at home." And so it's a beautiful home, "the choicest of fish, turbots, sturgeons, souls, lobsters." Right? We're getting, like, insane food going on. And "plenty of the best of foreign spirits. The wines," the old fellow said, "were almost too cold for his stomach." And cold, of course, being something that we don't get very often in the summer in Ireland in the 1800s. And sure enough, by eating and drinking as much as possible of the food, of the brandy, of the wine, he is indebted to the Fae for 50 years. And so this is just one of many examples of the food being too much, the wine being too seductive, and promises being underneath what you think is just a— an offer of hospitality.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: Now, if you ask me, I would say there's a lot to think here about perhaps the English colonizing Ireland, giving them a crop, introducing monoculture, having potato blights happen in the 1840s and '50s and many times thereafter, not just in Ireland, but also in the Highlands of Scotland, where some of these tales also originate, and how a gift from a wealthy person might in fact turn into your own downfall. I'm sure scholars much smarter and well more versed than me in Irish literature have had some things to say about this, but those are some of the connections that I'm drawing of how needing to keep your wits about you, think a bit about the motivations of someone that's a little bit too good to be true. And also being content with your lot. This is a little bit of the, you know, the Irish character of not wanting to reach too high, not being too tall of a poppy. But a lot of these myths kind of end in the sort of, like, rye lesson that if we'd just been content with what we had, we would have been perfectly fine. Instead, you reach a little bit too high, you eat the lobster, you drink the brandy, you sip the wine that's mysteriously in your house, even though you know, you know in the back of your mind that it's not a great idea. And there goes the rest.
JORDON: And the Fae, they love a bargain. They love a bargain.
JULIA: They do.
AMANDA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: It's like—
AMANDA: Whether you know you're bargaining or not.
JORDON: Yeats' book right here with me.
JULIA: Yes.
AMANDA: Hey.
JORDON: I realized it was, like, on my desk.
JULIA: You knew what was happening.
AMANDA: You're prepared.
JORDON: I know. I was like, "That's—" I was like, "Oh." I want to get to drunken mischief in fairy—
JULIA: Hmm.
JORDON: —culture.
JULIA: I think it's really interesting because I think part of what makes the Fae scary to the normal mortal human, right? Is this idea that they don't play by our rules. And so to have a Fae doing mischief or doing something that is outside of the realm of the normal, of the expected, that is something that is inherently— if not like always scary, something that tells us that they're, like, not people. You know what I mean? And so to have a, like, drunken, mischievous fairy or goblin-type character causing mischief, it is one of those things where it's, one, to explain the unexplainable. So, like, you know, you go into your barn and, like, all of the hay has been thrown around or, like, all of the order that you have put into place within your own realm, whether that is the household or the farm or the village or what have you, having something that is messing with that order and inviting chaos is the, like, balancing act of mythology, right? Like there is always this sort of separation between the wild and the maintained, right? The village and what is outside the walls of the village.
AMANDA: Hmm.
JULIA: And I think the—
AMANDA: Don't stray from the path, little red. Don't stray.
JULIA: Exactly, exactly. And so to go into, like, the Fae realm is straying from the path, right? And so to have this, like, chaotic force that you have no control over and to have that manifest as a drunken, little goblin, I think is so sort of classic to mythology in that way.
JORDON: It's a little preview of the Fae world coming to the human world where—
JULIA: Yeah.
JORDON: —then once they're in the realm, it's all chaos and mischief.
JULIA: It's not even necessarily chaos because a lot of times in, like, mythology, and especially in the more modern interpretations of that mythology, there is, as Shakespeare said, "Method to the madness," where there is an idea of they have rules that we don't understand and so that translates to us as chaos. And this is why— and I— I'll talk about the sacred hospitality now. This is why the sacred hospitality around Fae lore is so interesting because in general mythology revolves around these stories that reinforce sacred hospitality, which is this idea that if someone has eaten food under your roof, they must be under your protection. And to break that hospitality is an extreme taboo. Like, some of the worst punishments that we see in, let's say, Greek mythology are when the sacred hospitality has been broken. So what is interesting about Fae lore and don't eat the Fae food and everything like that is that the trope is reversed in that way when we're talking about the Fae, because that is specifically designed to highlight and emphasize that the Fae are not human. And that is what makes them dangerous because something that we consider fundamentally a taboo in the human world that would be, like, punished by the divine if it were broken. The Fae break that taboo as a rule. It is inherently reversed. And that is what is so scary about the Fae.
AMANDA: Yeah. It's wonderland. It's the upside down, right? It's where everything is topsy-turvy in the things that you think no matter where you go in the world, somebody will offer you, you know, a clean place to sleep, some bread, some water, you know, something to fill your stomach, help you get to wherever you're going. Even that is something you can't count on when you are with creatures that are so different from us that even this, I would argue, definition of humanity, which is basic hospitality to others, is broken. And that, of course, that risk can be sexy, right? Even in ACOTAR, right? Like you have a guide. There is a character that is helping our mortal to figure out, understand, navigate, stay safe in this world. There are people giving warnings to this, you know, younger sister who is doing her best. She shows her pure heart and they try to help her in turn. And that is also, I think, one of the reasons why the fairy food and wine is so popular among modern romantasy because, of course, it's sexy to share a meal, sexy to share a drink, right? These are tropes that we know. But there is this undercurrent that heightens it all of risk, of danger, of care, and of someone choosing to violate the norms of the world they're from in order to protect the, you know, the sexy lady who came under their mountain.
JORDON: And actually, it's funny, I was just thinking of another part during ACOTAR between the Fae food and that those hospitality rules are restored. I think a major part of the Fae lore in ACOTAR is they have what's called the mating bond.
AMANDA: Yes, they do.
JORDON: Your true destined love, and to accept the mating bond, you make a meal for your mate.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: So—
AMANDA: You do, indeed.
JORDON: Yeah. So between Fae, hospitable. Outsiders—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: —inhospitable.
JULIA: Yes. And like that is something that they really drive home specifically in the first book. That is like the Fae are predatory towards mortals. And, like, to run into a Fae is established, like, in— at least the first half of that book as a death sentence, right? You run into a Fae, you are going to be dead, or at the very least, they are going to play with you until you die. You know what I mean?
JORDON: Uh-hmm.
JULIA: And so that is a very like— they're separating the— like the rules here are for the Fae and Fae alone. And when a human tries to interact with those Fae rules or those Fae laws, that is when things go really, really bad.
AMANDA: Yeah. And like Julia said, that is the point of mythology and folklore. It's to teach us how to be human, to teach us how to act in society, to help us draw those boundaries between desire, fantasy, impulse, urge, and what we all need to do to live together in a sort of acceptable way. One of my favorite figures from Irish mythology is actually a cousin to the leprechaun. It's called the Clurichaun, which is—
JULIA: I was hoping you would talk about this.
AMANDA: —specifically a leprechaun style little guy, you know, six inches high, looks like a little gnome who lives in the bottom of breweries and distilleries. And this is a great example, too, of like, okay, a little bit of drink is okay. It's part of the Irish character. What are you gonna do? But excess is excessive. That's too much. That's not what we're gonna do. And so as in many examples of folklore, you know, the Clurichaun sort of exemplifies human tradition and habit gone a little bit too far.
JULIA: Hmm.
AMANDA: And so he's the example. He's the one you can point to, to say, "Hmm, that's actually a little bit too much." When you like your drink too much, when you like excess too much. I love that he, like, wears silver buckled shoes. He wears blue stockings, okay? Blue is very expensive fabric in Ireland in the 1700s.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: He likes finer things too much. And of course he likes to drink too much. And so for the Clurichaun specifically, if you have, as in many Fae lore , a modest and measured relationship with him. He'll prevent your wine and beer from spilling. He'll make sure that thieves don't come and steal your wares. He'll keep the cellar really nice, he'll make sure it's clean and orderly, and also give you some warning if there is, like, a danger coming toward your household. But if you break that symbiosis, if you, you know, make bad drinks, if you disrespect him, if you disturb him, or if he just turns malicious, then there could be things being broken, animals being frightened, attacking people that offend him, and almost worst of all, spoiling your wine.
JULIA: I do think it's really interesting. There is a certain, like, line in which there are fairy creatures that are cool associating with humans. Like, we talk a lot about that with, like, house brownies or house spirits that are, like, these spirits that almost have a symbiotic relationship with humans in mythology. And then we have—
AMANDA: We live in a society, Julia.
JULIA: Exactly.
AMANDA: You know? You get your beer.
JULIA: I wanted to say that earlier.
AMANDA: You get your milk.
JULIA: But like this idea of like, "Yes, okay. So, like, I'll do these things and you'll help me out in this way." But the minute that that relationship is soiled, or the minute that the rules are broken, that's when the chaos breaks loose, right? And then there is this, like, interpretation of the high Fae, right? This idea of, like, the fairies that are just so out of the realm of, like, what humanity is, even though they often resemble humanity in some way. And that's where, like, the confusion arises, especially in the modern romantasy tropes.
JORDON: I was thinking, you know, a lot of these— even in, you know, spirit depiction, we have you know, absinthe and the green fairy.
JULIA: Hmm.
Amadna: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: And that is the bargain that you go into with that green fairy during the consumption of absinthe. It should only be this many or, you know, bad things will happen and you start to hallucinate. And I'm starting to think just, like, different ways that shows up in drink culture.
JULIA: Uh-hmm. For sure. I don't have a ton of, like, bad drink lore, unfortunately. Like, obviously, we are talking about the sort of, like, don't eat the fairy food, don't drink the fairy wine situation. The only one that I'm, like, striking on right now is there is a mead of poetry in Norse mythology where it's like if you drink this mead, which has a really messed up origin. It is like a— it's a man who was made out of the spit of the gods after they signed the truce between the Aesir and the Vanir. And so he was, like, a very knowledgeable, like sort of, like, seer-type man. And then one day, he is visiting these two dwarves and because he has so much knowledge, they kill him and they drain out all of his blood. And then they mix it with honey and they create this mead that anyone who drinks it turns into either a poet or a scholar.
JORDON: Hmm.
JULIA: And so, like, my thought is like, while that has terrible, terrible origins that feel very Fae-coded, it has a positive outcome of, like, yeah, you just have to sort of give up your humanity by drinking the blood and honey of this man. And therefore, you are now a poet or a scholar in the realm of, like, where the gods are at in terms of this artistic ability.
AMANDA: Yeah. And you lose your humanity in order to kind of touch that or channel that spark of the divine, which itself is too much for a human mind to hold. After mentioning absinthe, which is a great example, I came across like this painting from 1895 by Albert Maignan called The Green Muse, where a—
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: —fairy is, like, strangling and gouging the eyes out of a poet, representing absinthe on which he has become dependent in order to make his art.
JULIA: Hmm.
JORDON: Well, I mean, that's so— that's— I mean, this could be in an even broader conversation, but you talk about— you know, so many people will say, you know, "Oh, this particular artist is sober now and now they don't make anything that's good." Not true, by the way.
JULIA: Yes.
JORDON: But, you know, this like— this notion that we need extra help from outside of ourselves to— in order to create good work and good art is really interesting in that we could pin that on some sort of otherworldly entity like a green fairy.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: Yeah. I think it's a really misguided but very understandable human urge for perfection, where I think the point of, like, the fairy food that looks beautiful but is rotten underneath, or the beverage that is so delicious and tastes of sunshine and moonlight and everything else under the sun, but ultimately harms you, is that— there is no such thing. And humanity, society, life, all of it requires the bad with the good. It can't be fairy wine for every meal and, you know, the ever apple for every dinner. It has to be meaningful and human and flawed and complex in order to count and to be sustainable. And so that's why this— you know, I— when I often think of fairies and fairy tables, I think there's actually a scene from an early Holly Black book. I was the perfect age, by the way, to consume her literature as I was a teen. It was very impactful. But just this idea of, like, walking into a forest and by moonlight, there is like a, you know, incredible glow, a party, a banquet, a table. It's so beautiful. And then when you approach, you realize that, you know, there's something that they need from you that you might in the moment be tempted to give, but actually isn't worth it because the life you were dissatisfied with or, you know, wanted more for yourself from is actually worth so much more than giving it all away for a fantasy.
JULIA: Hmm.
JORDON: Interesting. Or a quick, yeah, quick fix to their life.
JULIA: Yeah.
JORDON: Unearned fix, I guess. which there would be consequences from. Okay. So I want to get into just a little fun exercise with you two, since you guys are probably the perfect people to ask. I think we can all give our answer here, but you're a Fae in the Fae world. What food or drink based on you does someone consume to stay in your world?
AMANDA: Oof.
JULIA: That's a tough one. I— you know what's wild? And this is going to sound crazy, but you gotta stay with me here. Bean dishes. I think like a well-cooked bean dish is, like, phenomenal and out of this world and usually seen as like a very humble food. But, like, imagine like the perfect cassoulet or like a perfect kind of, like, creamy bean, like, dip or like sauce or something like that. I'm, like, super into that. I really think that would be absolutely delicious.
JORDON: What—
AMANDA: Julia, that is the most peasant-core Strega Nona stuff you have ever said, and I am into it.
JORDON: Honestly, that felt so mythologic just then.
JULIA: Thank you.
JORDON: Like that was a— that's a beautiful answer. I'm like, "Yeah, of course."
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: Okay, let me go totally different. Mine is gonna be like a light buttery crostini with some mascarpone cheese.
JULIA: Sure.
AMANDA: Some, like, brandy poached pears, maybe a couple of, like, pomegranate seeds on top, maybe a little bit of basil or mint, some fresh herb. And I'm picturing this being like in the dead of winter, and yet we have, like, delicious summer peaches and fresh cheese and delicious herbs, buttery cracker. You can just eat it forever.
JULIA: Okay, I will say, Amanda reminded me I was a cheese monger for 10 years. The perfect cheese board is actually the correct answer for me.
AMANDA: I think a cheese board the size of a table is—
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: —is pretty much what it's gonna be.
JULIA: Yeah, like have you ever seen how beautiful they set the food on the TV show Hannibal? Like that—
AMANDA: Yes.
JULIA: —but it's just all cheese instead of, like, human flesh.
AMANDA: You know what the prosciutto is, Julia. Don't worry about it.
JULIA: Yeah, yeah.
JORDON: And that's maybe one of the most irresistible things to humans currently is the perfect cheese board.
JULIA: Oh, yeah, it is.
JORDON: So you know how to capture them. And you guys just gave such beautiful answers and my answer is so outside of that. But I think I can personally never resist the siren call of a Nerd's Gummy Clusters. So—
AMANDA: Oh, yeah.
JULIA: Yes.
JORDON: So mine is definitely a Nerds Gummy Clusters. You're in the in-between world and it's actually an airport. And, yeah, like—
JULIA: I think— to elevate it a little, I think your land is just like the first room that they go into in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
AMANDA: Yes. You're waking up the palate with all of that—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: —amazing citric acid.
JORDON: Colorful, sort of tastes like poison.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JULIA: Yeah.
JORDON: Yeah, it's bad for you.
AMANDA: Unusual colors, I'm into it.
JORDON: Okay, last one. You're throwing a fairy party for your friends to celebrate May Day or Beltane. What wine are we— or what drinks are we serving? What are we having for dinner? What are we having for dessert?
JULIA: Oh, man. So I'll give two answers because we're a cocktail show, but I also obviously love wine. My cocktail answer is the Last Word, which is an equal parts cocktail. It is gin, lime juice, maraschino liqueur, and green chartreuse, which I think is the most Fae-coded liqueur that you can possibly get on the planet. Only two people at a time know the recipe. It has, like, 160 different herbs. It's a secret, it's made by monks. Like you don't get more Fae-coded than that in my humble opinion. Yeah.
AMANDA: I [53:32] get that recipe, Julia. It sounds a little otherworldly. I don't know.
JULIA: Yeah. That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. And then for the wine, there is an incredible white wine that I'm kind of obsessed with right now. It is, I believe, called like Soulographie or Soulographie. And it is like oddly salinic, but it also tastes like fresh green apples and has, like, a little bit of like a— like sulfuric, like harvested from a volcano sort of taste to it. Like it has a real terroir of, like, exactly where it was grown. And I absolutely love that wine. That is my go-to wine, especially now that the weather's warming up.
AMANDA: Julia, how did you not mention that the maker is called Sons of Wine?
JULIA: Oh, because I totally forgot that.
AMANDA: I think I would get an amazing, delicious orange wine. That's been my go-to. I'm a trend girly, and orange wine has not left me since a few summers ago. And specifically, because we're recording here on International Workers' Day, I think I would try to source one from a wine cooperative, from—
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: —somewhere that people can do the wonderful risk-sharing enterprise of going in together on costs and also profits. I think there's nothing more human than that.
JULIA: Hell yeah.
JORDON: Oh. I think I would go with— I can't stop thinking about this wine. I tried it a couple of months ago. It's an Austrian Sekt, which is Sekt is the Austrian and German equivalent to a spark— their sparkling wine, if you will.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: And this particular one was made with Gruner Veltliner, which to me was so interesting and it tasted like— it tasted almost citrusy, a lot of green apples. So something more akin to like a sparkling Sauvignon Blanc.
JULIA: Oh.
JORDON: And it was just the strangest but best thing I've had in a long time. And I can't stop thinking about it. And I feel like that is very Fae feeling.
AMANDA: Uh-hmm.
JULIA: That's how I felt the first time I had Lambrusco where I was like, " It's sparkling and also red? How is that possible?"
JORDON: A little sweet, it's so good.
JULIA: Yeah.
AMANDA: That's how I felt when we did a live show in Chicago and someone served Malört to me on the stage and I said—
JULIA: First.
AMANDA: —"We're doing this." And it felt like I fell down a rabbit hole.
JORDON: That's a— that's from a nefarious fairy, for sure.
JULIA: For sure. Trickster energy.
AMANDA: That's why it's— that's why they only serve it in little two-ounce glasses. You can't take more than that.
JORDON: Okay, what are we having for dinner?
JULIA: Ah. Okay. I think you have to do a sort of like wine-braised meat of some kind, right?
AMANDA: Ooh. Let's go.
JULIA: And I think it's more mysterious if you don't know what the meat is.
AMANDA: Julia said, "I'm bringing Hannibal into this."
JULIA: Okay. No, I am so sorry because like talking about this, I realized that the book that I'm currently reading, which is called The Starving Saints by— let me look that up real quick. The Starving Saints by Caitlin Starling is so coded to this conversation that we're having right now. And obviously, I'm gonna say a little bit darker than ACOTAR is, but if you kind of like the darkness that happens in ACOTAR at times, a very interesting novel.
JORDON: I'll take that recommendation.
AMANDA: I kind of like the magic trick where a vegetable tastes like a steak. And so—
JORDON: Hmm.
AMANDA: —I think a great pairing for this amazing kind of, like, soft, braised, great textural mane would be some, like, seared, grilled, delicious, herby, seasonal steaks of like cauliflower, turnip, you know, kohlrabi.
JORDON: Uh-hmm.
AMANDA: Like a bunch of stuff that we'd just really want to sink our teeth into.
JULIA: Hmm.
JORDON: Hmm. I was thinking something 'cause I think gardening is magic, but if you've ever seen the squash flowers that people—
JULIA: Yes.
JORDON: —will serve sometimes. Some with like ricotta and herbs and things like that. And they're like this, like, very savory, beautiful presentation, too.
JULIA: Uh-hmm.
JORDON: That would probably get me.
AMANDA: And I think just to remind us of, you know, humanity, like whatever is seasonal and delicious in that moment. If we're in, like, the week of the ramps, the week of the garlic flower, whatever it might be, that'd be a great thing to include.
JORDON: Uh-hmm. Great. And most importantly, what's for dessert?
JULIA: I am not a huge dessert person. However, I do like anything that is lemon-flavored. So like a really, like, light lemon cheesecake, a sort of, like, super light, you know— I say light and then I say olive oil cake, but a light, like, citrusy olive oil cake would also be totally my jam with, like, maybe some crystallized rosemary or some other kind of herb on top.
AMANDA: I would totally fall for the fairy food if it was like an otherworldly Yuzu key lime pie. Like—
JULIA: Hell yeah.
AMANDA: —I'm done for.
JORDON: I think something like— you mentioned olive oil, some— like an olive oil ice cream with less—
JULIA: Hmm.
JORDON: —sea salt over top, or maybe even like a lavender ice cream.
JULIA: Oh, yeah.
JORDON: Something like that.
JULIA: My favorite.
AMANDA: That one would get Julia.
JULIA: Yeah. You got me. I'm in there. The Fae have me now.
JORDON: I don't know. We've lost her.
AMANDA: What a way to go.
JULIA: Worth it.
JORDON: Okay. Well, I really wanna thank both of you for your time and for your knowledge. This was a lot of fun.
JULIA: It was our pleasure. Thank you so much for having us.
AMANDA: Delightful. And y'all are welcome over our hearth and at our table anytime.
JORDON: Okay, I'm joining. I want to thank Amanda and Julia for their time and magical answers. You can catch new episodes of the Spirits Podcast every Wednesday to listen and learn about all things spooky and supernatural. You can email us your comments and questions at podcast@wineenthusiast.com. Remember, you can subscribe to this podcast on Apple, Spotify, and anywhere else you listen to your favorite shows. You can also go to wineenthusiast.com/podcast for more episodes and transcripts. I'm Jordon Kaplan. Thanks for listening.
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