Forests provide us with so much! My meal is a tribute to the mushrooms I picked from the forest earlier this week. One mushroom is well known - the Chanterelles. The others are not so common on a plate. But maybe they ought to be! This was a delicious mix of late-season mushrooms from western Oregon.
Foraging My Wild Mushrooms
I've been using different wild mushrooms in some of my earlier entries for the Steemit Iron Chef contest. That's because I've been finding a lot of edible wild mushrooms this autumn - even when I visited my parents' in Arkansas, where there is a drought!
But the mushroom season is getting late here in western Oregon as we move into December. Would I find any wild mushrooms that are good to eat? That would be ironic, wouldn't it - if I couldn't find any wild mushrooms to cook when the Steemit Iron Chef featured ingredient is mushrooms!
But I did find an interesting selection of wild edible mushrooms. Yay! It's the end of the chanterelle season in my area. Most of the chanterelles I found were past their prime, split apart, soggy, and mushy. But I did find a few good chanterelles, mostly under the moss on the forest floor.
The other mushrooms are not so well known. I'll write more about them in future posts. One kind, the Helvella Elfin Saddles, have a bad reputation. But I know how to identify and prepare specific kinds of Helvella mushrooms, so I won't have my liver destroyed! Not even the Steemit Iron Chef contest is worth a destroyed liver!
- Soggy, split chanterelles that are too old to pick and eat! I'm glad I found some that were still young and firm!
- Red-belted polypore, Fomitopsis pinicola. There's some potent healthful compounds in that tough mushroom!
- Elfin Saddle, Helvella vespertina. Some Helvella are not good to eat, but this one is OK if it's prepared correctly.
- Cat's Tongue mushroom, Pseudohydnum gelatinosum. This little jelly fungus grows in the deep, dark, dank forests, on little sticks and in the moss. It has little spines, just like the tongue of cats!
- Witches Butter, Dacrymyces chrysospermus. This isn't the more commonly known Tremella Witches Butter that's found on deciduous trees and parasitizes other mushrooms. It's not even related! But this decomposer of conifers is still fine to eat!
- At the end of my foraging day, I stopped at a local spring to forage some wild water. There's usually other people getting water here, too.
- When I got home, I foraged some Wild Field Mustard, too, to go with the mushrooms. I picked this Wild Field Mustard in my yard. It's just the older version of the wild mustard microgreens I used with my Pumpkin Custard for Steemit Iron Chef 8.
Cooking My Wild Mushrooms
I didn't want the flavor of any of my mushrooms to be lost in a lot of ingredients. So I tried to keep my cooking simple. I roasted the chanterelles in the oven, first alone, and then with a dash of olive oil, salt and pepper. I served them on a bed of sauteed Wild Field Mustard, so a palate cleanser. The mustard is flavorful, without over-powering the mushrooms.
I parboiled the Helvella vespertina Elfin Saddles for 5 minutes. Then I dipped them in a simple flour and water tempura batter, and deep-fried them in safflower oil. The boiling makes sure there's no monomethyl hydrazine left in the mushrooms -- rocket fuel, yes, mushroom-made rocket fuel, is not good for anybody!
For the cats tongues and witches butter, I made a simple syrup of sugar, water, and fresh-squeezed lime juice. After reducing the syrup by half, I soaked the little yellow globs of witches butter and the cats tongues - and then put them in my food dehydrator. That dries the little mushrooms and turns them into little flavorful gummy bears.
I also made tea from the Red-belted Polypore. It's bitter, so I added a dash of the lime-and-sugar-syrup. With that, the tea became something worth drinking!
- My Elfin Saddle, all cleaned up and head to parboil.
- Parboiled Elfin Saddles, ready to dip into a tempura batter and deep fry.
- I grate the red-belted polypore and then simmer it for about 30 minutes for a great tea -- but it needs some sweetening!
- Chanterelles, ready to be cleaned up.
- Chanterelles, in a cast iron skillet, ready to roast at 400 degrees F.
- Cat's tongues, washed and drying on a towel.
- Cat's tongues, steeped in a lime-sugar syrup and on a dehydrator tray, ready to dry overnight. They turn out like gummy bears!
Eating My Wild Mushrooms!
This was a fun meal of mushrooms to make. I think anyone who likes mushrooms would enjoy this meal - and maybe even people that don't think they like mushrooms! It's amazing to me that mushrooms can provide us with drinks and desserts, too -- and without being hidden away in a lot of ingredients.
What Do You Think?
- Have you ever eaten any of the mushrooms that I used in my meal?
- Do you forage for any mushrooms?
- Would you eat my mushroom medley?
- Which mushrooms would you like to read more about?
I eat a lot of wild plants and show you how, because I believe that we can all have lives that are richer, more secure, more grounded, and more interesting by getting to know the plants and the land around us – in our yards, our parks, and our wild places.
I would like Steemit to be the premier site for Foraging on the Internet! If you have any thoughts about foraging, or experiences to share, write a post and be sure to use the Foraging tag. And check out the @foraging-trail to see curated quality posts about foraging. Happy Foraging!
Thanks @progressivechef for creating the Steemit Iron Chef contest series!
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Plant and Fungus List
- Wild Field Mustard - Brassica rapa - leaves
- Chanterelle mushroom - Cantharellus spp.
- Red-belted Polypore - Fomitopsis pinicola
- Elfin Saddle mushrooms - Helvella vespertina
- Witches Butter mushrooms - Dacrymyces chrysospermus
- Cats Tongue mushrooms - Pseudohydnum gelatinosum
