Mushroom question

[foxfish]

You can quite safely grow your own oyster mushrooms but it is not as easy as the box suggest.
The spoors are readily available but you will also need to have a supply of suitable logs & a 12mm drill bit, then the process is simple.

Ref the mushroom hunt - sometimes the expert is to general, you need a specific hunt for edible species.

 

[Lil Dragonfly]

When I saw the title of this thread I thought you guys were referring to a different kind of mushrooms...

 

[Andy.Round]

I have an interest in mushrooms and have bought identification books, but am (and should be I guess) nervous about eating. During my recent trip to Brittany we went walking through the forests and there were lots of mushrrooms.

Foxfish you mention 'In my mind it is always best to go on organised forays' does anyone over here organise trips?

 

[foxfish]

Yes Andy the La Societe organise a couple of walks in the autumn.

 

[foxfish]

Fairly average season so far but I had my first puffball for two years today.
You cant really mistake a puffball for anything else so pretty safe to collect & a very welcome culinary delight!

 

[lynsea]

well i never saw this coming. freediving and mushroom hunting... i never would have thought someone would have been doing both. very cool though! you definitely have one of the most unique sets of hobbies i have ever encountered.

 

[foxfish]

The recent rains have brought on a flourish of beautiful free food during the last week or so.
The open grassland has given the opportunity to harvest the tasty Parasol & the woods gave to me my favorite Cep.
So much fungus is popping up all over the place, honey fungus loves the old elm tree stumps that are so common in my area & although easily recognisable not one I harvest!
For our supper we had cheese stuffed Parasol drumsticks - you need to collect them just before the open up, when they are in a drumstick shape.
Simply remove the thick fibrous stork & stuff the remaining cap with a filling of choice. I then coat the cap in a light beer batter & fry in a sauce pan half filled with olive oil until the batter crisp.....looks like a scotch egg but taste a thousand times better!

 

[budleigh spearo]

i found a fair few ceps today they seem to of poped up everywhere

 

[ekinoderminator]

I loaded up on some chanties in early october. It was a typical midnight run - left home at 8pm, slept in a rest stop close to my destination at 3am, up at 630am, picked til 1pm, back home at 11pm with 50 pounds of chanterelles! Soon the fall boletes will start - queen boletes (boletus aureus). Also there will be what the local italians call cocorra (amanita calyptrata). Following that season are the central coast chanterelles and more - on and on.

I say the one on the LEFT is certainly amanita and NOT an edible amanita. The one on the right I would need to look at closer but I do not think it is an amanita.

 

[foxfish]

Yes I know about you crazy guys eating certain amanita!
We don't get amanita calyptrata at least I have never heard about one being found.
I have never seen 50lb of chanterelle before! quite a haul..

 

[mifcifmum]

i found a fair few ceps today they seem to of poped up everywhere

Simply remove the thick fibrous stork & stuff the remaining cap with a filling of choice. I then coat the cap in a light beer batter & fry in a sauce pan half filled with olive oil until the batter crisp.....looks like a scotch egg but taste a thousand times better!

 

[Mr. X]

I wasn't planning to collect fungi this year but I spotted a very nice nice big Horse Mushroom in the hedgerow while out running at the weekend. I had a very strong feeling that it was Horse Mushroom (just like a very big regular mushroom) but thought I better check it against the 2 fungi books I have. It matched the Horse Mushroom most closely (& apparently they are most often found in October/November) but the gills were definitely white to bright pink and not grey as one book state. So I did a spore test, which confirmed it was not one of the possible inedible alternatives (brown spores rather than white). The gills also turned brown while I waited for the spore test - another good sign. Ate some of it Monday, it tasted good and I'm still here, so it seems to be good (risky business).

Foxfish is right about conditions. Those heavy rains seem to have been just what the fungi like. A colleague show me a picture of a nice, big, but inedible fly aggaric (the fairy tale book toadstool) he'd seen while out running/walking at the weekend. Wet summers are supposed to be good for ergot too ... best stay off the rye bread or they'll be witch trials (some think the Salem, MA witch trials were due to people hallucinating after eating ergot contaminated rye). Apparently ergot contaminated rye is quite valuable in the UK as the pharmaceutical companies will buy it.

 

[ekinoderminator]

where I live - near San Francisco, Califoarnia, occasionally Horse Mushrooms fruit in large quantity. A place called Point Reyes National Seashore:
California Coastal Records Project - Image 200505396 - "Drake's Beach, Point Reyes National Seashore"

The bluffs have been compared to the White Cliffs of Dover. It is a magical place with many hidden tresures - Horse Mushrooms being one of them. What I find here is that tons of rain is too much rain. Fruiting is best when a series of light rains are followed by warm weather. I love the almondy fragrance of Horse Mushrooms.

 

[Magpie]

I've never been a big fan of mushrooms, but the girlfriend is so we went out for a mooch at the weekend.

Think it's a bit late in the year but there was plenty of fungi about, though most didn't look like the edible species I recalled from following my old girl about as she filled her basket when I was but a nipper.

We still had a nice mixed bag of parasols, chanterelles, russullas an old bolete (found a good area with some huge ones, but they were all old and manky, one for earlier next year). I tried the unopened parasols the Foxfish way, stuff with cheese, battering and frying, and they were very nice, cheers mate.

 

[foxfish]

Nice one Tom although I have never been keen on collecting russullas, your mum was far more confident than I will ever be.

 

[Magpie]

I know what you mean mate, if they didn't look exactly the same as hers used to and hadn't come from exactly the same place as she used to get them I wouldn't have touched them. Then again, sometimes she would taste things to see if they were the poisonus ones! :hungover

Not easy to identify the different russula types, but Sarah is still going having scoffed them saturday so guess they were ok!

 

[Mr. X]

Found more horse mushrooms this weekend, enough to fill a small basket and still leave the small one behind for another day. The idea of using a basket rather than a bag, of course, is that it gives allows anspores to fall to the ground for future growth (although it seems like most come out enmasse over night).

 

[foxfish]

Horse mushrooms are very desirable even if it for their smell alone!
No much you could mistake them for when large but beware the yellow stainer when young! (although again, Toms mum would happily show you that yellow strainers are not toxic to every one by eating a small piece)

 

[Old Man Dave]

Hardly ever seen so many mushrooms as are about at present. Bearing in mind that I am not going looking for them then I keep seeing them everywhere. Walking home from work today I passed at least a half dozen mushroom/toadstool/fungi of assorted size, colour and shape. Driving over the last few days I have seen large specimens by the roadside as well as numbers of smaller ones and again all shapes and colours. Unlike my brother I have absolutely no knowledge of what they are but there certainly are lots.

Dave.

 

[foxfish]

The winter mushrooms are starting to appear although we had a great haul of penny buns today we also had 6 of these .....