My take on Fungi... list of what I've eaten!

[John Cossham]

I've been collecting and eating wild mushrooms for over 25 years. I'm a firm believer in several rules about wild fungi: 'Only pick anything you are completely sure of'; 'only pick what you need'; don't pick over-mature specimens as they will be full of fly-larvae (and I'm vegetarian!).

Below, I list the fungi I can spot and identify with ease, not get confused with anything else, with my favourites first and my least favourites at the end. I'm doing this all from memory so my latin names might be mis-spelt. Although it might look as if I'm an expert and go willy-nilly collecting, I am in fact quite conservative, cautious and careful. Take heed of the little phrase about gastromycologists: 'There are old mycologists, there are bold myclogists, but there are NO old and bold mycologists.'

Oyster, Tree Oyster: grows on trees and is difficult to confuse with anything else. Often in big clumps, sometimes several kilos. Well worth picking, common, my overall favourite based on abundance and usefulness.

Shaggy Ink Cap, Lawyers Wig, Coprinus comatus: common on grassland, lovely taste when young but get them home quickly as they 'deliquesce' or autodigest and turn to black liquid. If this happens, take the liquid and water your nearest lawn with it! I like these gently simmered in butter or oil, makes a wicked soup with a very delicate flavour. You probably won't confuse it with the Common Ink Cap, which is less common, and edible, but contains a chemical which prevents your liver detoxifying alcohol. So if you eat the Common Ink Cap, do not have any alcohol 24 hours before or after consumption, or you risk severe illness or even death, as alcohol is a very toxic substance.

Honey Fungus, Bootlace Fungus, Armillaria mellea: the first wild mushroom I identified, picked and ate, and still one of my favourites. Not a favourite of arbouriculturists and orchard owners, as this species attcks living trees and the bootlace-looking mycelium can travel many metres 'looking' for victims! The fruiting body is very variable but nearly always in huge clumps growing on trees and stumps. Best cooked and it has a sweet flavour, hence the 'honey fungus' name and the 'mellea' name which is latin for honey, I think.

Chicken Of The Woods or Sulphur Polypore: my absolute favourite for taste and texture but quite a rarity... except in my garden as I have innocculated several logs with it! Also good as the fruiting bodies can get up to a kilo in weight! My only criticism is that the flesh can be a tad dry, so maybe use it in stews where the moisture of the other veg helps. Only eat young specimens as older ones can induce sickness. I have experienced this sickness... and once you've thrown up, you feel a lot better. If you feel nauseus after eating these, just make yourself vomit.

Winter Mushroom, Velvet Shank, Enokitake, Flammulina velupites: easy to spot in the winter growing out of logs, it is bright orange and the base of the stem is very dark and velvety. Even grows in snow and frosts. They are quite small and you need to find plenty of them to make a meal, but added to rice (for instance) they add some flavour and look great! Also good as they are one of the only fungi available at this time of year. I also grow these in my garden.

Shiitake: not a British native, but I bought innocculated dowels and have a huge lump of oak which flushes irregularly. A good general purpose mushroom, very good to eat. Unfortunately the slugs love it so when it flushes I have to go out in the evening and do horrible things to the local fauna to preserve this import for my own use!

Jew's Ear, Wood Ear, Auricula: These are very common and grow all the year round especially the damp seasons! Almost exclusively on Elder, but recently I found some on what I think is an Alder log. They are an unusual food; if you like Japanese food, you may have had their local species, 'white back', cut into strips and stir-fried. But I have better use for them. Jew's Ears shrivel and dry up in dry weather, but absorb vast amounts of water when wet. So I pick them when wet, clean them up, and let them dry. When I've a jar full I put them in the blender and reduce them to dust and tiny pieces. A spoonful of this dust, added to an over-wet stew, will absorb loads of spare juice, and the tiny bits of mushroom re-inflate and becone slivers and chips of a black gelatinous but tasteless stew-adjunct.

Fairy Ring Mushroom, Marasmus orieoides: grows in grass in rings and is locally abundant. But small. Great chewy texture though, and well worth having a few in with other dishes. Could be confused with other small brown grass-dwellers, but if it's in a well-defined ring or line, that's a good pointer to what it is.

Parasol: several species, all edible, I think! I don't find these very often but they are easy to recognise, and a large but not over-old specimen is worth eating.

Wood Blewit, Lepista nuda: grows in my front garden because for years I've brought back logs and branches on my bike trailer and chopped them up there, ready for my 2 woodstoves. So because of the layers of sawdust, this grows. It's quite a nice mushroom, a pretty lilac colour in the gills, and reasonable eating.

Boletus, Penny Bun, Cep, etc : there are quite a few edible Boletes but I would always check with my copy of 'Philips' to see if it looked like an inedible or poisonous one . Easy to distinguish as it has pores not gills. I don't find many of these and am not good at distiguishing the different species, but I would take note of where it is growing... such as near a Larch tree, could be Larch Boletus, Birch tree, could be a Birch Bolete, etc. These are lower down my list as the identification is less easy, but if you are sure you have a good 'Boletus edulis', then it is a worthwhile.

Field Mushroom, Agaricus several species: like what you find in the shops, but usually more tasty. I avoid the ones which stain yellow when cut or bruised and mature ones which are invariably more insect than mushroom. I rarely go looking for these but I'll sometimes cycle past a horse-field which has lots in it and I'll pick a load.

Giant Puff Ball: I've only found this once, and it was bigger than a football. I shared it with several friends. I had it fried in slabs in olive oil... mild taste, bit of a novelty.

Morel: I've only found this once, on my allotment, with my fork stuck through it. I didn't eat it, I took it to have it identified as there are several species. But I'd recognise it again, if I managed to spot it....

Beefsteak fungus: very easy to identify, felt very proud I'd found it, cooked it and tried to eat it but it was unpleasently sour. I'd admire it 'in situ' next time.

Stinkhorn, Phallus impudicus: I tried one of these in it's pre-eruption 'egg' stage and it was utterly disgusting. I cooked it whole and only managed to eat about a quarter of it. I would not eat one of these agian unless paid a considerable bribe.

Chanterelle: never found this, still looking. Ditto Cauliflower fungus, Hedgehog fungus and others.

I have to finish with the only officially 'non-edible' species I look out for, the Liberty Cap or Magic Mushroom: Psylocybe semilanceata: When I was 18 I had these for the first time and the effects were striking. The intoxication which followed opened my mind to the fact that all animals, plants, rocks, air, water and my fellow humans are all made of star-dust, we are 'all one', all connected. I suddenly felt a deep love for everything which has lasted well beyond my last ingestion of these innocent looking fungi. I also experienced deep peace and one-ness for the first time. My advice is that if you must experiment with this, do it with someone you trust, make sure your set and setting are right (how you are feeling within yourself, and where are you going to be when you are under the influence, and with whom?) and treat it as a learning experience, not a recreational one, although you might well enjoy it. I have a lot to thank this mushroom for, as it was just weeks after taking 100 of these within a group of about 20 of us, with a sober but experienced guide, that I went vegetarian, got into feminism and green politics, and the next 25 years are a testiment to the immense benefit that it did me. I do not believe that I would have had those insights without this drug experience, which was akin to a religious conversion. I truly believe I am a better person having had this experience. However I do not reccommend it for anybody, especially older people, as the effect of smashing apart your preconceptions and throwing your personality up in the air to have it settle down again could cause some people to be very mentally unwell afterwards. It is a powerful experience not to be taken lightly. Be careful. Oh, and there are legal implications, as if you have some in your pocket, you could be accused of 'preparing a Class 'A' Drug', which could result in a fine or imprisonment.

(I have posted this list elsewhere but hope it meets new eyes here)

[Carltonian Man]

Hi John
An interesting list, there are plenty of mushroom foragers on this site ranging from very occasional pickers right up through to expert level, so you’re in good company here.

Re giant puffballs; posted a couple of piccies from Aug 2009, blown up there are 43 PB’s in the top photo (over 200 counted in the one field over three photos).
2010 not a single PB to be found in that same field but half a mile away there were dozens.
That’s my size 11 alongside for scale.

PS can’t always manage to eat a whole PB fresh but dried and ground into flour it keeps well and is tasty added to nut loaf etc.

[gregorach]

Boletes and chanterelles are my faves... We get quite a lot of both in the pine woods up in the Highlands. I reckon I can spot boletus edulus at 50 yards these days. :) Boletes are also great for drying. I did find a beefsteak once - sliced laterally and fired in butter with a crack of balck pepper, it was lovely - very steak-like.

[kit-e-kate]

Hi all, That's a very interesting list;

Mine is; shaggy ink cap, chanterelles, bay boletes, cep, st georges mushroom, parasol mushroom, jew's ear, and i've seen a cauliflower fungus but it was way too old to be of any use. I've never yet managed to get back to where i found it though. And (although a temporary exile in London at the moment) i have spotted a tiny clump of of what i think are velvet shanks!

Carltonian Man, i am very jealous of your puffball field, it looks brilliant!

John Cossham, please give me some tips on finding oyster mushrooms! I really enjoy them but have never ever managed to find any! And all my guidebooks are really vague and seem to make out that they grow really commonly. I can swap my top tips for finding chanterelles with you in exchange.

[Carltonian Man]

All the oysters I’ve found have been on dead wood with a taste ranging from completely bland through to gorgeous nutty. The colour also, without exception has been beige-brown, never the blue-grey depicted in most mushroom guides. If you do strike lucky Kit-e-Kate it’s worth returning to the same spot a few weeks later as they often fruit again.
Re velvet shanks, to help in confirming the ID the shanks have a figure 8 (ish) cross section.

[kit-e-kate]

Brilliant, thanks! I'll keep my eyes peeled! Do you think they favour a particular type of dead wood? Annoyingly i actually think i may have spotted some oyster mushrooms when we were out for a walk on Sunday, but we were out with some (quite posh) friends of my husband that i don't know at all well and i didn't think it would create a good impression if i suddenly dived off into the undergrowth!!

Also, i've remembered that i can add porcenlain mushroom to my found list. Not gathered or tried any yet though, they do look a bit odd!

[Carltonian Man]

Have definitely found oysters on silver birch and beech but due to the lack of bark etc I couldn’t say for sure about other host species. Only ever found them on deciduous trees but I understand they do occasionally grow on pine. The absolutely best flavoured mushies came from inside a hollow tree, drawing moisture from the tea coloured water that had pooled there. Picked them week after week for over two months but always left plenty of caps to go full term and drop their spores.

Have never tried porcelains (I imagine them to be a bit fiddly to peel for what’s on them) but we do always go to have a look at them; such lovely looking things. If you try some let us know what you think.

[fungi2bwith]

I've tasted porcelain mushrooms. They needed lots of rinsing in water to remove the slime, but they were very good with a meaty flavour unlike any other mushroom I have tried.

[kit-e-kate]

I've tasted porcelain mushrooms. They needed lots of rinsing in water to remove the slime, but they were very good with a meaty flavour unlike any other mushroom I have tried.

That's interesting, i'd read something similar. I'll have to be brave next time! They are very very pretty, aren't they.

Thanks for the extra hints on Oyster Mushroom, Carltonian Man, I can't wait to get home and get hunting! (Although it'll be St Georges season by the time I get back home....Luckily i think i remember where i've spotted some of them!)

[kit-e-kate]

Hi all, just resurrecting this thread to tell you that I have now (about 20 mins ago) tried some porcelain mushrooms. I peeled the slimy skin off first and then sauteed them in butter. Not bad, but still a bit metallic tasting for my liking. Glad i tried them, but i won't be rushing out for them again...