Tried writing a prompt using only restaurant menus as inspiration

Last Tuesday I grabbed 3 old menus from diners in my neighborhood and used them to build a fantasy world. I turned a breakfast special into a potion recipe and a side dish list into a guild roster. The result was this weird scrappy setting that felt way more real than my usual medieval stuff. Has anyone else tried using random everyday stuff like receipts or signs as writing fuel?

3 comments

3 Comments

nguyen.blake1mo ago

Oh, that's a clever idea. I once used the back of a receipt from a hardware store to sketch out a magic system based on paint colors and tool names. Turned into this whole thing about alchemists who could liquefy memories and store them in old mason jars. Never finished it but I still have the napkin somewhere in my desk drawer.

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moore.beth1mo ago

Honestly, that reminds me of my friend Jen who once mapped out a whole fantasy economy on a pizza box while we were waiting for our order. She had this whole thing about using different pizza toppings as currency and it got weirdly intricate.

anna4911mo ago

@nguyen.blake will that napkin fund your retirement one day lol