# Does lembas taste like crap to the elves? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 9, 2005, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209 "2005-02-09T15:59:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Trunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/87869e/32.png) [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/1 "2005-02-09T15:59:14Z")
Sure, the Hobbits liked it (for a while). But I figure to an Elf, _lembas_ tastes like hard tack or a Power Bar or something. Also, do elf farts stink to the lesser races or do they smell like flowers? I bet flowers. ---
**Author:** ![ddgryphon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8c91f0/32.png) [@ddgryphon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ddgryphon)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/2 "2005-02-09T16:38:37Z")
Nope, tastes like Zwiebac [http://boredoftherings.150m.com/bored\_excerpts\_main.html](http://boredoftherings.150m.com/bored_excerpts_main.html) ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/3 "2005-02-09T17:33:07Z")
You are destroying some of my idols. 🙂 I would say flowers, though. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/4 "2005-02-09T17:44:09Z")
I used to pretend that my Fig Newtons were lembas bread. Where’s the embarrassed to be such a dork smiley? ---
**Author:** ![CandidGamera](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/candidgamera/32/2878_2.png) [@CandidGamera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CandidGamera)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/5 "2005-02-09T17:58:03Z")
The Rivendell Nutritional Council thanks you for your inquiry. While most of the Elves of Rivendell love and adore Lembas, the Official Food of the Middle-Earth Elven Sports Association, a small minority of the population has moved away from the traditional Lembas-based diet. However, it should be noted that only a few expressed dissatisfaction with the taste - a flavor chosen after centuries of research by the National Lembas Corporation. Rather, some of the Eldar, having had little exercise in recent centuries, due to the paucity of conflict in Middle-Earth, have found themselves developing dwarf-like proportions in their midsections. As a solution, some of these so-afflicted have begun trying variations on their food sources, including the popular Southron Beach diet. We hope this answers your cocnerns; we have it on good authority that the National Lembas Corporation is working feverishly on new low-carb recipes for Lembas, and expect results within a few decades. In the meantime, please accept this complimentary cookbook : _101 Best Lembas Recipes of the Third Age_. ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/6 "2005-02-09T18:02:46Z")
Elves do not smell like flowers. Their _farts_ smell like flowers, though. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/7 "2005-02-09T19:48:07Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > I used to pretend that my Fig Newtons were lembas bread. > > Where’s the embarrassed to be such a dork smiley? Around here? Anyone of them. Wait, I’m not a dork, I’m a geek. _points and laughs at **kaylasdad99** _ ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/8 "2005-02-09T20:26:18Z")
Chicken. It tastes like chicken. ---
**Author:** ![Malodorous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e47774/32.png) [@Malodorous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malodorous)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/9 "2005-02-09T22:39:59Z")
> [@OP](#): > > Also, do elf farts stink to the lesser races or do they smell like flowers? I bet flowers. Inhabitants of Middle Earth do not have sex, go to the bathroom, fart, etc. In the Silmarillion, I’m not sure they even eat. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/10 "2005-02-09T22:44:12Z")
Of interest to all pervy Elf fanciers, is Elf sex as messy as human sex? I bet Elf spooge tastes like ice cream, meaning Elf husbands get blowjobs whenever they want. No matter how you slice it, Elves are just better at everything. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/11 "2005-02-09T22:45:25Z")
> [@Loopydude](#): > > Of interest to all pervy Elf fanciers, is Elf sex as messy as human sex? I bet Elf spooge tastes like ice cream, meaning Elf husbands get blowjobs whenever they want. > > No matter how you slice it, Elves are just better at everything. I agree, and it’s much cleaner and much less silly. ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Purl_McKnittington)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2005, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/12 "2005-02-09T23:11:48Z")
> [@Malodorous](#): > > Inhabitants of Middle Earth do not have sex, go to the bathroom, fart, etc. In the Silmarillion, I’m not sure they even eat. How did Sam and Rosie have all those babies, then? Asexual reproduction? And then there’s all that half-elven business. They _must_ have sex – what’s the point of a heriditary monarchy without it? I think Elf farts are probably silent and non-deadly. You’re not even aware that they exist. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2005, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/13 "2005-02-10T00:06:05Z")
Though Elves most certainly “git it on”, I personally am Elf-fart agnostic. Avari? Probably. Maybe some of the Teleri (excepting the Sindar). But the High Elves? Farts in Valinor? Did Fëanor occasionally let rip in his smithy while forging the Silmarils? That I seriously doubt. As for Lembas: My guess is that Elves will tire of everything eventually, being immortal and bound to Arda. “Nothing new under the Sun”, and all that. No matter how tasty Lembas is, they’re bound to get sick of it after a few hundred thousand years or so. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2005, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/14 "2005-02-10T00:11:08Z")
Lembas is not an accustomed food to most elves. The recipe is a tightly-controlled secret, probably known only to Galadriel in the Third Age. She, in turn, would have learned the recipe from Melian the Maia, and Melian wouldn’t have learned it from anyone. The gift of lembas was a greater gift than most of the party could realize, and may have been the first time a non-elf ate it at all. So no, it was not like common hardtack. As for the rest, Orcs are presumed to be derived from corrupted Elves, and I’m quite certain that orcs fart. So the capability is presumably present in Elvish physiology. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2005, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/15 "2005-02-10T00:14:57Z")
Don’t they have New Lo-Karb Lembas by now? With Atkins being all the rage, surely the Elves would want to get in on the action… ---
**Author:** ![Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kilvert_s_Pagan)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2005, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/16 "2005-02-10T00:17:55Z")
> [@Anaamika](#): > > I agree, and it’s much cleaner and much less silly. Nah… if their sex was that great, you’d think Elrond could have fathered children a little more often than once every 5000 years or so… ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2005, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/17 "2005-02-10T00:49:38Z")
Not even a glance at **CandidGamera** ’s beautiful post? Am I the only one without an ignore list? As for: > [@](#): > > Sure, the Hobbits liked it (for a while). > But I figure to an Elf, lembas tastes like hard tack or a Power Bar or something. > Also, do elf farts stink to the lesser races or do they smell like flowers? I bet flowers. Elves being immortal and all, and with the perfect physiology implied by that fact, I’d be willing to bet they produce at most 10% of the flatulence of even a Numenorean human and less than 1% of a lower human. Less still than the gluttenous dwarves who, although endowed with stout constitution, are not picky eaters. Elves who subsist on Lembas–a perfect food for a perfect creature–would experience negligible flatus which would be released imperceptibly upon defecation. If hobbits are any measure as to the palatability of a particular food item, I might suggest that Lembas is pretty damned tasty as evidenced by Pippin’s managing to stuff 4 cakes into his greedy maw before the party pushed off from Lothlorien…which action appears to have produced flatulence in him, but then hobbits have been known to produce rectal offgassing upon demand in much the same way some humans can swallow air and belch despite not having eaten for many hours. Elves can remain, by all accounts, unperceived by the lesser races, there is no reason to believe their farts would give them away either. Probably smells like clover flower, hence Haldir’s pet name for Legolas “Yrrichal Caeriathol” which translates loosely as “Fart Blossom,” a subtle dig at Legolas’ lesser, non-Lembas eating heritage. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2005, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/18 "2005-02-10T01:03:01Z")
> [@tpayne](#): > > Nah… if their sex was that great, you’d think Elrond could have fathered children a little more often than once every 5000 years or so… I don’t have the cite, but I’m pretty sure Elvish women can choose to be with child any time they like, so long as they’re gettin’ busy with their He-Elves. Now doesn’t that make you jealous? _They don’t need birth control_!!! Gah! ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2005, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/19 "2005-02-10T01:06:22Z")
[What Tolkien officially said about elf sex](http://www.ansereg.com/what_tolkien_officially_said_abo.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2005, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209/20 "2005-02-10T01:13:17Z")
Thanks, **Qadgop**! Glad to see I’ve not lost my mind completely…from your cite: > [@](#): > > Elves do not remember and celebrate the day that they were born as the day they came into existence. Instead, they celebrate the day their parents begat them. That’s the day their parents had the sex that conceived them. (LACE) Apparently, there was some parental will involved in the act of begetting. Either that, or they were having so little sex that it was easy to remember. “Pregnant? How did that happen? Oh, that Thursday three turns of the seasons ago. Oh yeah…” This seems like a good moment to mention that Tolkien was Catholic, so this was compatible with his religion and belief system. I favor the former hypothesis. Elves were gorgeous and generally perfect in almost every way. How could any self-respecting Elf man resist all that fine Elfin nooky? You figure during their courtship Galadriel and Celeborn stopped an heavy petting? I think **not**. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-lembas-taste-like-crap-to-the-elves/289209.md?page=2)