Are prepared meals kinda a trap?

[Charles]

I am trying to use food to generate happy thoughts for my dwarfs. While looking into that I am not seeing any benefit to prepared meals. It seems like it would be better to import a lot of different raw food and then dump them in the middle of the tavern floor.

They only seem to care if the food is their favorite and its value determines the thought strength. So with cooking bugs in mind, it seems like importing a bunch of crap and throwing it on the floor would be more effective. Especially since they seem oblivious to if a prepared meal even has their favorite food item in it.

Some suggestions would be appreciated, thanks!

[Iggy the Unwise]

Can’t tell for the current version, but in previous the food had quality and the most complex food used up to 3 ingredients to boost the chances of dwarf consuming something they like.

[AlP]

Meals increase the value of ingredients, and the thought they generate improves with its value.

Also, meals multiply the number of any ingredient they contain. If you only have a stack of 5 of a rare ingredient, you can cook it with a large stack of drinks or quarry bush leaves and have the entire stack of meal contain that rare ingredient.

[Fel]

When it comes to food and drinks, dwarves care about a few things.

Raw food is alright early on but they tend to ask for prepared meals after a few years (small negative thoughts from raw food, mostly negligible).

Repetedly consuming the same food/drink gives them negative thoughts, so you want some variety, prepared meals are usually good for this since it has several different ingredients and it is relatively hard to make them all use the same exact ingredients.
For example, when they decide to use some meat, all sorts of meat items can be used and they all count as different ingredients.

Last but not least, they get a positive thought when consuming something that appears in their preferences.
It is often not something you have much control over, you won't even have access to the right ingredients for most of your dwarves in the first place but they also grab a random one when going to eat, without trying to go for their preference over something else.

[BobthenotsoGreat]

Simple meals just keep them alive (2 ingredients). Lavish meals (4 ingredients) have a much better effect.

They don't eat as often as they drink (40%) so offering a variety of quality meals is the key to happiness thoughts. So when they don't receive a thought from the quality of the meal, they may receive one from the items within it. They do choose so...

Lavish meals require 4 ingredients of which 1 must be a solid.

If I go down that route I embark with a proficient cook, 10 of each cheap meat type, fish and milk.

I also embark with 2 planters, 1 of which brews and the other one process plants so I also have cave wheat, rock nuts (quarry bushes) and sweet pods.

After turning milk into cheese I have 6 food types and all 4 dorf drinks. The 6 food types allow all sorts of variety and this works fine until the trader. Lavish meals prepared properly can be worth around 100 per piece and they are produced in stack sizes that are additive so 35 ingredients total will give you 35 "roasts", the term for lavish meals.

This can be considered exploitative as you can generate 20k in food for your first trader. But I want them to have quality meals with a lot of variety so I regularly start this way.

Quarry bushes cannot be brewed but are the best filler producing leaves at harvest and after processing for seeds.

Also, try to add the drinks in there too for more combos. You are more likely to hit the ingredient thought. Obviously booze comes first but with stockpile management, you can cook with the excess.

Oh and finally, when you have excess seeds, these to can be included. If its variety you want this method seems to work great.

But if they go out in the rain, just once....its that that they remember.

[AlP]

Originally posted by Fel:

it is relatively hard to make them all use the same exact ingredients.
For example, when they decide to use some meat, all sorts of meat items can be used and they all count as different ingredients.

I forbid all food except the four ingredients I want them to use, and the kitchen standing orders help.

So every meal I make contains specific ingredients, which I choose based on the preferences of my dwarves.

[Charles]

Originally posted by BobthenotsoGreat:

But if they go out in the rain, just once....its that that they remember.

Thanks for that line, that was funny. I have a dwarf with a profile like that. It reads like that one time he got caught in the rain was the most traumatic and life altering thing in the world. Apparently it permanently changed his disposition, which is absolutely hilarious.

[Fel]

Even by forbidding like that, you will have some that have 2 or more of one of the ingredients, not every meal will have all 4 different ingredients.
That can only be done through an extremely specific setup of stockpiles (1 tile stockpiles with no barrels set to give to the workshop), with a relatively long distance to make sure the first doesn't get refilled before all ingredients are picked.

DFHack used to have a way to specify each ingredient individually but I'm not sure if they added it back yet (it was requested a while back but not by that many people).
It was the best way to handle specific prepared meals since you could have several different work orders for different prepared meals (same for the drinks).

[Charles]

Originally posted by AlP:

Meals increase the value of ingredients, and the thought they generate improves with its value.

Also, meals multiply the number of any ingredient they contain. If you only have a stack of 5 of a rare ingredient, you can cook it with a large stack of drinks or quarry bush leaves and have the entire stack of meal contain that rare ingredient.

Ahh, that's a good way to look at it. I totally overlooked the idea of using it as a rare food multiplier. That actually changes my approach to my cooking setup.

[Charles]

Originally posted by Fel:

Even by forbidding like that, you will have some that have 2 or more of one of the ingredients, not every meal will have all 4 different ingredients.
That can only be done through an extremely specific setup of stockpiles (1 tile stockpiles with no barrels set to give to the workshop), with a relatively long distance to make sure the first doesn't get refilled before all ingredients are picked.

DFHack used to have a way to specify each ingredient individually but I'm not sure if they added it back yet (it was requested a while back but not by that many people).
It was the best way to handle specific prepared meals since you could have several different work orders for different prepared meals (same for the drinks).

Okay, so I want to run an idea by you. I would appreciate it if you could point out any points of failure you see.

I am going to set up a kitchen with 4 one tile stockpiles next to it without barrels. 3 of those will be linked to three separate stockpiles with locally produced goods. I'm thinking Flour, sugar, and syrup or a liquor. The final stockpile will be the closest one, and it will be linked to a quantum stockpile with all of my imported/unreliable solid cooking ingredients.

In theory it should use my plentiful local goods to extend the imported ones and pump up the food value. Also, maybe with all the non local stuff on the same tile in the same pile it will force them to choose at random. With the non filler ingredients being closest they should always include it regardless of if the other tiles get refilled or not.

[AlP]

That's how I set up my kitchen. I don't use any linked stockpiles, Food is separated into 4 quantum stockpiles, everything is forbidden except the exact 4 items I want to be used:

https://i.imgur.com/D4QNk2s.png

[Fel]

It should work, but it seems like it would be a lot of work for little benefits.
The main reason AlP described his setup and I answered was because he wanted highly specific ingredients to be used.
These ingredients would be what some of his dwarves have in their description ("prefers to consume X") since those give those specific dwarves a positive thought beyond the normal "ate in a legendary dining room".

If you don't have such highly specific ingredients that you want to include in most prepared meals, you don't really need to bother with all of that.

[Charles]

AIp, can multiple dwarfs pull from the stockpile at the same time? I have noticed my dye dwarfs fight over the dimple dye barrel and it throws up some job cancellations. I was not sure if a quantum stockpile would fix that. Also thanks for sharing your setup, the picture was a nice visual aid!

Fel, I am mostly trying to keep my dwarfs as happy as possible. I want to learn how to understand and deal with their negative thoughts. I still notice the negative thought about not having a good meal and haven't learned how to resolve it, same with stuff like them wanting family/friends but having none in the fort. This is my first fort and I started on an easy, very calm, biome. I am trying to learn all the systems before I try the more interesting locations. I guess this is me trying to find out the ideal way to feed my dwarfs in the most positive mood creating way. I hope that doing a setup like this might resolve the bad thought about food and fulfill the listed need for a nice meal. How do you typically handle feeding them? Also is it even worth it in the grand scheme of a fort?

[BobthenotsoGreat]

I like to set it up once and forget. I do this by arranging the stockpiles around the kitchen. The four corners 2x2 are meat, fish, cheese, plant leaves (quarry to start then others as I add them). Then nice things go in a 2x1 right next to where he stands. There are upto 12 2x1 available and they can be just added as new ingredients come in like seeds or drink that only gets filled when I have excess. It also allows expanding any stockpile out if I buy excess from the trader.

That works for me but I want variety not value so I am not fussed. By embarking with a proficient cook he adds value in a short time anyway.

[Fel]

Only one dwarf can cook at a time in that setup, that is why there is only one kitchen and one brewery in the screenshot.

The "not having a good meal" means that they ate a raw ingredient instead of a prepared meal.
When a dwarf is hungry, the game asigns the "closest" food item as his target and starts the "eat" task.
Like with all other "closest" checks, it is not the path length but the direct distance, disregarding walls and floors.

The usual way to prevent dwarves from trying to eat an ingredient is to put the ingredients stockpile(s) in a place that would be "further" in the majority of situations.
For example, directly above the stockpile for prepared food when the whole fort is further down, or relatively far in one direction (preferably a direction that is not used much in other z-levels).

[Charles]

So if I only feed them prepared meals It should resolve any negative thoughts about food but wont necessarily give them a positive thought? Assuming there is sufficient variety so its not the "same old booze situation but with food".