The fastest thing on the planet!

Another amazing video from BBC Nature. Apparently, a tiny fungus that lives on horse poo is the fastest thing on Earth. The spore pod is ejected from the fungus body at 20,000 g. Wow! I hope you enjoy the clip as much as I did, and see you next week!

Alternative to plastics?

This is what a fungus really looks like

Like most people, I start my day by browsing news sites. After looking through headlines for top stories and confirming that our planet is still more or less in one piece, I go on to see if there's anything new happening in the world of fungi. I usually find stuff in the category of nature news, sometimes in the category of crime news, and occasionally under weird news. My favourite items though are on innovation and technology. I love learning about the possible ways in which fungi can change the world, and one such piece was published just yesterday.

Many people think of fungi in terms of their fruitbodies, forgetting that the most important and persistent part of the organism is the mycelium, or hyphae, that live in the substrate under our feet. Mycelium itself can be edible, so it is rather unjustly ignored. However, the article in question brings out a different use for it, namely, as an insulation and packaging material. Apparently, it's cheap to produce, it's less toxic, more vapour-permeable, fire-resistant (as shown on CSI New York) and very, very eco-friendly. It is manufactured by a company called Ecovative Design and they claim that it provides a viable alternative to structural insulated panels made with plastic foams.

Town of the future: a typical street

It looks like there are still issues that need to be resolved before people start routinely insulating their houses with fungi (most notably, how do you prevent them from getting wet and turning into rot?), but it's certainly a development that has potential. Who knows, maybe in 10-20 years all new builds will be Ecovative's "Mushroom houses". I personally can't wait for that to happen.

The full article can be found on the Earth Techling site.

Image credits:
Hyphae as seen under an overturned log
Smurfs decoration

Is it edible, or poisonous?

And the moral of this story...

I once heard a story about a man in Russian village who was an avid mushroom gatherer. In the warm time of year he would go to nearby woodland, or to the fields, and bring back a good crop, the greater part of which would be dried, pickled or frozen by his wife to be enjoyed during long Russian winters, and some of it she would make into family dinner. One day they got a neighbour, who came to settle in their village from a city. The delicious smells of mushrooms cooked in sour cream reached his nostrils, he knocked on their door, and they grudgingly invited him to share their meal.

The culprit

The next morning the man and his wife were working in their garden when their new neighbour staggered out of his house, all green-faced, and claimed that they had fed him poisonous mushrooms. The man pointed out that it was nonsense because they were all eating from the same pot, and both he and his wife were well. With gardening done, he got his basket and went on another foraging trip, and came back in the evening with more mushrooms. By that time the neighbour recovered enough for the delicious smell of mushrooms to lure him again to the man's house, and the meal was shared again.

In the morning... you guessed it. It is unknown how many attempts it took for the neighbour to get the message, but apparently in the end he thought that village life did not suit him at all, and he went back to the city.

If you read this post, you probably realised by now that the mushroom stew contained common ink caps, Coprinopsis atramentaria, and also that the good man and his wife were teetotallers, while their neighbour was a drinker. A common ink cap is edible and tasty on its own, but consume any alcohol with it, and you'll be off mushrooms, and food generally, for a while.

To summarise: someone you know likes to turn up to dinner uninvited? Now you know how to deal with the problem.

Image credits:
Soviet anti-alcohol propaganda poster from 1980s, public domain
Faltentintlinge (Coprinopsis atramentaria). Illustration by Albin Schmalfuß, 1897, public domain

Scotch bonnet risotto

Here they are, ready to go into
the risotto

Sorry if yesterday's post was frustrating. Someone told me that no one wishes to read about disappointments. However, I still think that a great part of the joy of hunting for wild food comes from not knowing whether a given trip would be fruitful. An occasional empty run is therefore essential, but nevertheless, here is a success story for a change.

As mentioned in the previous post, after I left the forest I went on to explore the local supermarket, and that's where I hit a motherload. Morels that I saw on my previous visit were gone, and instead the shelf was occupied by Scotch bonnets, marked for some reason as 'Mousseron'. Now, I have never picked these in the wild since I was not sure about their identification, so I was wary at first. But then I thought, hey, what good is my advice about 100% safe to eat fungi, if I wouldn't follow it myself? So I decided to give them a go.

In the pot... and on the plate

Given that they have rather small size, firm texture and distinctive sweet taste, the obvious recipe to use was a risotto. I followed Jamie Oliver's excellent instructions, adding the mushrooms at the stage when half of the stock was used up. Talking of the which, instead of standard vegetable stock I used porcini cubes that a friend got for me at Carluccio's. I was extremely pleased with the result, not just the taste, but the fact that Scotch bonnets worked really well with the al dente rice. Much better in fact than either button mushrooms or even ceps, so will definitely use these fungi again if I can get my hands on them.

They were safe to eat, too, as two days later I can feel no ill effects. Oh, wait, what was that stomach rumble?.. Nah, I'm fine, really.

But enough about edible mushrooms for now. This is not a cooking blog after all. I feel like I need to take time off from slaving in the kitchen and write about a rather fascinating poisonous fungus instead. Which one? Come back tomorrow to find out!

First foray report

Pick me! Pick me!!! - Erm, no.

As planned, on Saturday I set out to the forest to check if the first chanterelles were ready to sprout. It was the finest day of the year so far - +18° and not a cloud in the sky. Which did not prevent me from stashing a waterproof jacket into my backpack. I have serious trust issues with Scottish weather.

As it happened, this precaution proved to be unnecessary today, and the walk was pleasant throughout. But for one thing: the photo on the right represents the entire fungal presence I've encountered. Obviously, there have not been enough warm days for fruit bodies to form.

Wild strawberries - very tasty, if you
have the patience to pick them.
It takes ages!

One crumb of comfort was finding wild strawberries in full bloom, and it looks like there will be a decent crop this year. Some people collect the flowers to make scented tea, but I prefer berries, so left them be for now. Also, did not want to go too far into the undergrowth since I wasn't wearing any tick repellent.

So, was the trip a complete flop? Not quite. Realising that there's nothing to be had in the forest, I decided to look for mushrooms in a different habitat, aka the supermarket. And was it worth my while? Come back tomorrow to find out!

6 ways mushrooms can save the world

An interesting talk by mycologist Paul Stamets, originally posted in May 2008. Don't be put off by the length of the video: for a true fungi lover, these are 17 minutes very well spent.



His bio on TED web site: http://www.ted.com/speakers/paul_stamets.html

Have a good weekend, everyone, and see you next week, for the foray report and more.

Want to lose weight?

If you are, like me, a woman between the age of 30 and 50 and have a presence on social networking sites, you must share my frustration with the ads. Literally, all of them tell me I must click on them to learn this one "weird tip" on how to lose weight. And you know what that tip is? "Eat less, exercise more". Yep. Bad news. There is no other way to shed those pounds.

Agaricus bisporus, an often-
overlooked wonder food

Now, unless you are an active forager, mushrooms are not likely to help you with exercise. However, they can help you to eat less, or rather, significantly lower the calorie content of your food. This is because the energy content of 100 grams of mushrooms is just 16 kilocalories. For comparison, 100 grams of lean beef mince contain 173 kcal, and 100 grams of pork contain 263 kcal. The only foods with similarly low values are celery (14kcal), lettuce (14kcal) and cucumber (16kcal). However, none of these you can add to pasta sauce or a stew, while mushrooms will do just fine. Substitute half of your meat with mushrooms, and the calorie value of your dish will, too, drop by half. What's more, the meal will seem to be just as filling since you'd be consuming the same volume of food, and it will taste just as great because mushrooms would absorb and enhance any flavours already present.

Shiitake: packed with goodness,
waiting for you at local supermarket

I think everybody should love mushrooms just for this one wondrous property, but they have to offer even more. They are a great source of dietary fibre, five types of vitamin B and several essential minerals. Some exotic varieties offer significant health benefits, such as antimicrobial and antiviral properties, and even lowering the risk of breast and prostate cancer. But even the most mundane and widely available kinds are surprisingly good. Thus, white button mushrooms contain large amounts of powerful antioxidants (these protect your cells from damage and slow down ageing), and shiitake mushrooms will boost your immune system, lower blood cholesterol and help prevent heart disease. So, get some next time you go past the mushroom isle in your local supermarket. They are all good for you.

Image credits:
Agaricus bisporus, used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license;
Shiitake mushroom, used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

What to do with stale gorgonzola

Ingredients

Last night, thinking about my next post, I opened my fridge for snacks inspiration, and discovered that I had a fairly large lump of gorgonzola in it that was starting to go stale. My eye then fell on a pack of large flat mushrooms, and I knew what I had to do: combine large fungi with microscopic fungi in a delicious recipe. So here it is:


Ingredients:

4 large flat mushrooms (white or portobello)

All ready to go into the oven

100g of gorgonzola or any other blue veined cheese
a few cloves of garlic (optional)
1 tbsp of olive oil
bunch of flat leaf parsley or basil, to garnish

Process:

Chop the garlic, cut the cheese into small slices. Preheat the oven to 180C. Meanwhile, place the whole mushrooms with stalks removed in a fryng pan and fry them in olive oil for about 5 minutes, turning once. Remove from heat.

Lay out the mushrooms on a baking tray and place chopped garlic

Enjoy!

if using and cheese over each mushroom. Put the tray into the oven for 8-10 minutes. Garnish with herbs and serve while still warm.

Doesn't this look great? What's more, you are looking at guilt-free food. Mushrooms are not just tasty, they are good for you, and have a remarkably low calorie count. I'll write more on their extraordinary nutritional value in the next post.

Essentials and trinkets

As promised, today's post is about the mushroom hunting kit. There are many things that can be useful on a trip to the forest, and it's only too easy to get carried away and end up looking like a guerilla fighter. It may look cool, but is usually unnecessary.

Fortunately, this early in mushrooming year there is no need to carry much. The only quarry to be found are early chanterelles; the spots I am planning to visit are all on the verge on the forest, easily accessible and the round trip is only 5 km or so. The whole yield will fit in a small plastic fridge container. Therefore, the only essential bit of equipment this time will be a mushroom knife.

Lakota knife, say no more

I took out my knives last night to check that they are ready for this weekend. Over the years I have accumulated quite a collection, as my friends and relatives are aware of my obsession, and most of them think that a knife makes for a great Christmas or birthday gift. Not that I disagree in principle, but their ideas of what constitutes a good mushrooming knife are vague and occasionally bizarre, so my knife drawer contains a few monstrosities that are better suited for hunting bears. Luckily, some gifts turn out to be reasonable, and two such items have served me well over the years.

Lakota Rostfrei mark on the blade

Lakota knife. Bought by my father for a dollar in a car boot sale in the US in 1998. Amazingly comfortable handle, very light, high quality steel that I never needed to sharpen. It accompanied me on all my hunting expeditions as first choice. Its only downside is that it is a lock knife, so I have to remember to take it out of the bag after each mushrooming expedition, as despite the small blade size (2.5") it is not legal to carry in public without reasonable cause (a list of guidelines can be found on the GOV.UK web site). How fortunate that I do not suffer from memory lapses.

Swiss knife: mundane but useful

Swiss pen knife. I was presented this about 8 years ago, and it cost about £10. It has a 3" blade and it's light and compact. I bring it out occasionally, when someone else asks to be taken along for a foray. It does a reasonable job, but can be hard to clean because sand and grit tend to get into the folds for additional blades and utilities.

Heavy, but impressive features

Mushroom knife. I was presented this contraption a couple of months ago and haven't yet tested it out in the field. It features a specialised blade which looks like it will be good for cutting ceps, although I am not so sure about smaller prey, such as slippery jacks or chanterelles. The brush and jagged back of the blade should be very useful for cleaning the finds. It's quite heavy though, and I am not convinced that the screwdriver and can opener would serve a good purpose, but I'll give it a try.

I'd better wrap up here. This post is already too long, and what's more, has little to do with fungi proper. So the plan for tomorrow is to remedy this and present a new topic in this blog: cooking with mushrooms. See you soon!

What do you call six weeks of rain?

Common ink caps. Sorry guys, you really are not my type.

A well-known joke claims that the answer is "Scottish summer", and by this definition, we've already had at least two this year. The misery has been quite extreme even by local standards, but at least for mushroom lovers like myself there was a small crumb of comfort in knowing that all this moisture will make for a great mushroom hunting season, when it comes. And, in fact, it is almost upon us. I suddenly realised this today, on my regular walk through local woodland, with late morning warmth releasing aromas of the wet forest floor. Yes, warmth, you read that right. Today the temperature has reached a whopping 18 degrees. It's not just summer now, it's a heatwave!

Coming back to mushrooms, I know that in theory you can start your season in April or even March, but there aren't many grasslands around here (therefore, alas, no St George's mushrooms), morels are still an elusive dream, and common ink caps, while available all year (I've seen these fungi happily sprouting in the middle of January), and quite tasty according to some mushroom guides, unfortunately require total abstinence from alcohol for three days before and after eating them. Alas, this is a sacrifice I am not ready to make.

Therefore, my foraging season starts with the appearance of the first chanterelles, and with all the rain we are having, and with a bit of warmth, they should arrive any day. I have great hopes for the weekend, and this means that the subject of next post has to be mushroom hunting equipment. Need to make sure it's ready!

Humans may complain, but this forest is certainly enjoying
its Scottish summers, very much

Image credit: Common ink cap, Coprinopsis atramentaria, used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

Fungi are not plants... but...

Just for the sheer beauty of images in this video I am prepared to forgive the inaccuracy. I hope you enjoy this short clip from David Attenborough's series "The Private Life of Plants" as much as I did. I'll be back on Monday, with fungal facts, recipes and more.

Morels in Scotland

Dreams...

Morels are rather notorious for causing severe cases of black envy among mushroom pickers. If you haven't found one in the wild, you can't help but consider yourself a second-class fungal citizen.

I am one of these unfortunate souls. Every spring I go through a period of typing "morels scotland" into Google, to find stories of people spotting the elusive delicacies next to parking lots, on landfill sites, in neighbours' gardens... the list of unlikely and excruciatingly mundane locations goes on.

I'll find them in the wild... someday.

... and reality

This year though I found them on a supermarket shelf, which is the next best thing. Fried with shallots in olive oil, they were delicious.

While searching for cooking instructions, I was reminded of the fact that morels are mildly toxic if eaten raw. What? Potentially poisonous fungi in a shop? There, now you know how dangerous it is to follow even the most self-evident rules of thumb when collecting mushrooms.

Stay safe, until next time!

Image credit: Black morels, used under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

To forage or not to forage?

That is, indeed, the question.

Prehistoric humans getting food

To get at an answer, we first need to consider, what is the attraction of wild food in the first place? In my mind, the most important are two things:

• Wild mushrooms are free, just lying around, there for the taking.
• Bringing home wild food delights the prehistoric man in each of us. "Honey, I brought you a mammoth," - life just doesn't get any better than that.

But, hang on. Are wild mushrooms really free? If you think about it for a moment, no, not really. Taking into account the cost of kit and travel, one kilogram of ready-to-eat mushrooms will cost you about £15. By comparison, shops will charge you about £20 per kilo. The extra £5 saves you hours of walking, tick bites and having to tell everyone you meet in the forest some combination of "I know what I am doing, thank you", "I will be very careful", "Sorry, I cannot teach you to identify mushrooms", and (my favourite), "Get your horse away from my basket!".

Modern human getting food

With the myth of "free food" busted, prehistoric man becomes surprisingly easy to tame. I still occasionally succumb to the call to explore the woods, but searching for interesting mushroom products in supermarkets is just as important, and good finds I make there give me just as much pleasure. Occasionally it even turns out to be something you do not see in the forest. One such recent find proved to be particularly special, and this will be the subject of the next post.

Image credits:
Le Mammouth by Paul Jamin, public domain;
Voyager golden record, image 77, public domain

Identification and rules of thumb

The key point of the video that inspired the previous post was, "If you don't know what it is, don't eat it".

But how do you actually identify your mushroom, and are there any reliable indicators that the mushroom in question is edible?

Putting a name to a mushroom can be a challenging task, because the fruitbodies that we eat are not the organism itself but merely its reproductive organs. So what we are trying to do here is essentially the same as attempting to identify a mammal by the shape of its... erm... lungs or kidneys. How do we do that?

1. Fungus appearance. A good mushroom guide will list perhaps 30 possible characteristics that need to be looked at, such as cap size and colouring, shape and position of gills, stipe markings, etc. etc.   If you have all day, great, because you'll need it. Don't forget a dictionary. Half of the words won't make sense at first reading.

2. Ecology. Where is the fungus found? As mentioned in the previous post, there are many lookalikes that can fool even an experienced forager if put next to each other, but can still be easily told apart since they form relationships with different trees. For instance, the poisonous woolly milk cap from the previous post is associated with birch, while the delicious saffron milk cap grows under pine.

3. Spores. It is impossible to do a spore print in the field, but completing it greatly improves the chances for correct identification. Just put the spore-bearing part of your fungus over two pieces paper, white and coloured, and wait for 24 hours. If you want to be really thorough, you can also look at the spores under a good microscope, but this will probably take you over the line beyond which a hobby becomes obsession. Keep it healthy. Breathe.

Remember me?

But what if you don't wish to remember all of these details, and do not want to wait for spore prints? Suppose, you have a can of soup to improve NOW! Any, hmm, rules of thumb?

For instance, is the mushroom safe to eat if its cap peels? Or if you find it complete with a slug, happily munching on its stipe? In fact, deathcaps can be eaten by slugs and insects (they are unaffected by the toxins) and have a peelable cap. These are the two most dangerous misconceptions of which I am aware, but all other "edible mushroom indicators" I've come across are at best useless. So, are we definitely stuck with making spore prints?

Not quite. There is a bit of good news. One reliable rule of thumb does exist, and it is based on ecology. There is a habitat where all mushrooms that are to be found are 100% edible, guaranteed.

This place is your local supermarket*, and it is the subject of tomorrow's post.

Image credit: Amanita phalloides and slug, used under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license
_________________
* As with all rules of thumb, this advice is offered "as is", to be used at your own risk. If you do manage to get mushroom poisoning as the result of following it, sue the supermarket. They have more money than me anyway.

The first thing you need to know about fungi...

Now this is some good advice

Recently I saw a feature on BBC news, about a woman who decided to improve a can of soup with a deathcap fungus (Amanita phalloides) that was growing in her back yard, with predictable results.

The story is tragic, but eating any kind of amanita, or indeed any wild mushroom if you don't now what "amanita" means, is in my mind equal to violating such safety rules as "look before crossing the road" and "don't pour petrol over open fire". Deathcaps are not to blame. This mother-of-four was killed by her recklessness and ignorance.

Unfortunately, the video that goes with the article does nothing to address the issue. In it Mark Lloyd, chef and forager, gives some sensible advice, "if you don't know what it is, don't eat it", but also makes two statements that made me scream "someone is wrong on the internet" and run to the nearest networked computer to write this post.

"They <deathcaps> are wild plants". No, they are not. They have a kingdom of their own, Fungi, and are distinct from plants, animals, or bacteria. They have chitin rather than cellulose in their cell walls, which indicates that on the great tree of life they are closer to animals than plants. They also have a unique lifecycle that is unlike that of any other multicellular organism, but I'll leave this subject for another post.

Woolly milk cap and saffron milk cap.
Which one would you eat?

"A mushroom that grows in a certain area, under a certain tree, is perfectly fine, and if it grows under a different tree, it will draw toxins from that tree and become poisonous". Now, I'm not sure what's going on here, since this is presented as one of the "tricks" that you need to know before you go mushroom hunting. A not-so-subtle way to get people onto this chef's foraging courses, perhaps? The truth is, fungi can draw nasty substances from places like busy roads, or toxic and radioactive waste dumps, but not from plants. Instead, you can have two very similar species of mushrooms that are associated with different trees, one of which would be safe to eat, while the other may cause a stomach upset or worse. An example of these could be woolly milk cap and saffron milk cap, or yellow staining mushroom and field mushroom. Therefore, it is not a "trick" but a matter of proper identification.

There, it's off my chest, I can breathe again, until next time.

Image credits:
Deathcap warning sign, public domain
Woolly milk cap, used under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license
Saffron milk cap, used under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.