Had a really interesting talk at our local horticultural society last night all about poisonous and edible mushrooms. Didnt realise there were so many edible ones out there. Apparently us Brits are not as clued up as you guys on the continent. The slides were great. Think I'll get out there and look for a few, though I have no intention of eating them just yet!
Fascinating fungi
Picking mushrooms is pretty popular in Finland.... I haven't ever picked them and I only know a few edible ones :} They are pretty good anyway :)
I had a big book one year about fungi, showing all of them. I trawled the kids round the woods looking for them, but was too scared to eat any in case i made a mistake. Most of the ones i found would give a warning that there was similar looking poisonous ones which they could be mistaken for!Yet I love the different mushrooms that you get in the shops, I do a lovely mushroom risotto courtesy of Jamie Oliver.
sounds delicious sueone you wouldnt mind sharing it would you I love mushrooms with everything
We often went mushrooming when we lived in North Yorkshire. We once found a giant puffball in a field. Fresh we sliced it thick and fried it in garlic butter and then chopped up the rest and froze it and used it where mushrooms were needed - it lasted all winter.
It's true that the Brits aren't much into mushroom collecting. That village (Hovigham, for those of you who know North Yorkshire) was surrounded by woods full of ceps and chanterelles but the morning after we'd first cooked the puffball - we were greeted with "oh, you're still here then" everywhere we went - we discovered that word had got round that we were eating wild mushrooms and the rest of the village were getting ready to order the hearse!!!!
yes everyone I have spoken to recently has come up with exactly the same response. we are a nation of mushroom phobics!! :-(
Here in Switzerland, in autumn during mushrooming time you can take your self-picked wild mushroom to the council offices and there is a fungi expert who will tell you what you've picked and if you can eat them. He or she is there a couple of hours a day and the times are published in the local free newspaper.
that's a good idea gerddi, can't see them doing it here though, shop keepers would be up in arms!glad they didn't pre-order your coffins gerrdi.Looking through my book again though it's quite scary how similar the poisonous ones look to the edible ones,sometimes apparently it's by the spores that you can tell which is which.
My family were never that much into mushrooms anyway, think they were scared that if they were , they'd get force fed them !! they used to get teased at school because we'd eat salads with flowers in !!And look now, you can even buy the flowers in the supermarkets to decorate food with.I had a smashing book, 'Food for free'which gave you loads of ideas, I tried to find it ,but can't.Shame,
I've got that book and it's really good.
If you can't find it you could always pick up another 2nd hand as it was a poplular book.
The same author also did a book with his brother called "In Search of Food" and that even describes looking for Dorset Blue Veiny cheese. This a bit out of date now, though; they describe Wenseydale cheese as being made only by a few farms. About 10 years after it was published(my copy is 1978) the creamery in Hawes that sold the cheese was about to close down and was then rescued. It now runs a visitor centre and has Wallace and Grommit on it's small Wensleydales.
If cheese can make a come back, perhaps the Brits can be persuaded back into the fields and woods to look for edible mushrooms!
the other problem here i think gerddi is going on private land. I know when we visited Norway, they were saying about how people there have a right to walk, over here you're just as likely to be shot at !!That is unless you know a nice land-owner.I've lost count of the amount of times when the family was younger and we used to go on walking holidays, we'd get shouted at , even though we were on what was supposed to be a public right of way. It got so bad in the end, the kids and me used to refuse doing a walk unless it was on common ground or forestry owned!
Our Southcentral Alaskan town is on the coast of Resurrection Bay, so we get lots of moisture and lots of mushrooms. I've begun taking photos of them, and have developed an interest in them in general.
However, I have to say, I'm pretty phobic myself. There are puffballs all over my yard, but I'd not tried eating one until this year. Everytime I try a wild mushroom, I have the urge to leave a farewell note, just in case.
Just including this photo for interest, but these are not on my list of edibles.
Baa
Sep 20, 2002
We'd occasionally collect horse mushrooms. However, I shall never forget a previous boss telling me about the time their friends went mushroom gathering. All was well and good, they cooked the 'shrooms and placed them on the kids plates and then dished up their own. The kids ate the entire lot with nary a murmur.
Trouble was they'd also eaten the field fare's previous inhabitants (mushroom fly lavae) which had slid out on dishing up thinking it was part of the mushroom.
I'm not sure if mushroom collecting without the land owners is still permitted in Britain. I must admit I'd rather buy them than leave it to a chance identification with or without books.
Arsenic: I must be an old sot, because I'd rather pass on the ink caps than my well-earned evening cocktail!
Baa: Great story! A little protein for the kiddies! My mother used to soak morrells (sp?) in saltwater before preparing them just to get any residents out of them. Those were wonderful mushrooms, rolled in flower and sauteed in butter...yum! They have them up here in Alaska, as well, but none of the pickers will tell you where to look. I have been told to check woodland areas that have suffered a recent burn and are reforesting.