Ectoplasmic meal?

[Leeder]

One my player asked me, what happened if his wizard creates an apple from ectoplasm and eat it. Would it be tasty? Wouldn't it dissolve or transmutate into ectoplasm just inside his stomach? And other similar questions, a lot of them.

Of course, I can speculate and use my imagination, but I like to be more canonical. Unfortunately, I don't remember any mentions about eating ectoplasmic goods other from the feast in the Maeve's apartment in the Undertown. Do you?

[Quantus]

So long as the PC or somebody else has invested the energy to keep the form of the Apple, Id say they could eat it and it would indeed be tasty.  But in short order it would dissolve in their stomach back into ectoplasm, so it wouldnt give any nutritional value long-term.  There wasn't anything from the scene at Maeve's, just because its supposed to be bad to eat Fae food, because it somehow can bind you to them, but I always thought that might be more about them spiking it, kinda like how Harry catches Toot early one with food spiked with blood. 

[Haru]

I think the Fae binding thing is more a magical law of nature. They gave you something and are now entitled to get something from you in return. They might sometimes spike their food in addition, but since that can go against the rules of hospitality, that's probably not always the case.

Ectoplasmic food will probably dissolve too quick for you to be able to digest it. You might have better luck in the nevernever, where such things can persist for a longer period of time.

Fun fact, this was actually sort of my theory where the first Faeries might have come from. Some early humans stumble upon the nevernever and can't get out again, so they just settle down and live there. Since they are only eating nevernever food for generation after generation, food that is inherently magical, it slowly changes them to make them entirely magical creatures. The same is probably true for other types of animals.

[Leeder]

Haru, interesting speculation about fairy's origin.

Okay, your points guys agree closely with mine. Food, summoned from Nevernever, may be eaten, and even may be tasty, but don't sate the person who eat it. Thank you again!

[Haru]

I just remembered something else. I don't know which book, but at some point, Harry talks about magic burning a lot of calories. So even if you could create something nutricious, that energy still has to come from somewhere. And since you always lose some energy, you will not get back what you put into the meal you conjured.
If you have a sponsor for your magic, that might offset this problem.

And you could make vegetation grow faster and get nutrients that way. If you are able to pull the energy from somewhere that is not you, you might even net yourself some energy. Or you find a way to eat the energy from the sun directly. Might cause some indigestion, though.

[toturi]

 

Food, summoned from Nevernever, may be eaten, and even may be tasty, but don't sate the person who eat it.

I wonder if that principle is applicable to other ectoplasmic constructs ingested into the body.

[Quantus]

I wonder if that principle is applicable to other ectoplasmic constructs ingested into the body.

If you are thinking like drugs/medication/alcohol I could see it going one of several ways. 
1)  The drug dissolves back into ectoplasm after its eaten and so cannot stay long enough to have an effect
2)  The drug must be actively maintained by the summoning entity to that it stays long enough to have an effect
3)  The drug can maintain its own form so long as it was able to reach the Bloodstream, which can provide energy directly (as with activating a circle).
4)  A summoned drug would follow potion rules for some reason, and would be able to maintain its potency via that (somehow...)

[MadAlchemist]

I would say taste would be determined by shifts allocated to detail, starting with a complexity around 5 for fruits/vegetables or 3 for a cut of meat. As far as nutrition goes that could be a second effect if you want but handle it like biomancy, otherwise no.