Some years back I came to  Lappeenranta (Finland) to do my master studies in Information Technology. The little quiet town is very well integrated to the nature. The houses and buildings are distributed among parks, forest and lakes. The student hostel where I was living during those 2 years was just 2 minutes of walk from the forest. This forest was very popular place for  doing sports (jogging, cycling, nordic walking, or skiing – depending on the season). Of course, I could not miss the opportunity to explore the area and hunt for mushrooms. In Finland even privately owned piece of forest is available to public and everyone can exercise a right to pick wild foods (including mushrooms). So, I took my bike and headed out of town.

Well indicated roads make it easy to drive out of town and very soon I was riding on the empty road along the forest. The surroundings were amazing with its forests and occasionally some fields. Riding and enjoying by such beautiful scenery for a while I have decided to leave the road and go into the nature. So, I’ve stopped my bike and stepped into the forest. In front of me was wild northern forest with lost of pine, spruce, birch and other larch trees. Everywhere around was green moss, bushes of blueberries and other northern plants which I don’t know names for. And this wonderful smell!!! Ah, I love the smell in the forest – it activates all human sensations!

Bluberries

Bay Bolete – Boletus badius

So, I’ve started to walk with my bike slowly through the forest. Among the trees I’ve noticed lake and started to move towards it. However before I could reach it I had to cross some little distance which in fact was full of the precious mushrooms – Orange Birch Boletes, Birch Boletes, Bay Boletes, Weeping or Granulated Bolete, Stinking Russula, Yellow Swamp Russula,  Crab brittlegill or Shrimp mushroom, Chanterelles – all of them were on my way. It’s a pity I did not take many photos of them. They were just everywhere, in any direction. I just could not keep myself (or better to say my hands) out of them and very quickly I packed myself with collected mushrooms so that I had no means to  carry them.

Beautiful lake in Finland

Bay Bolete in a group on the left side of photos

That was a good moment to slow down, to take a deep breath, to look around and enjoy of the nature beauty. I went on a rocky lake side and watched the nature in silence for a while. Feeling inspiration I have even made a little 4-lines poem

Then, I took all my mushroom laggage and drove home where I have my harvest sorted.

Collection of wild edible mushrooms	Wild edible mushrooms collection – Birch Boletes, Orange Birch Boletes, Weeping Boletes
Birch Bolete and Orange Birch Bolete	Stinking Russula – Russula foetens
Yellow Swamp Russula or Yellow Swamp Brightgill – Russula claroflava	Russula paludosa
Chanterelle – Cantharellus cibarius	Me cleaning Russula mushrooms

I’ve had a great time hunting for mushrooms and now it was a time to cook something delicious out of them. So I did and have invited my roommates for a dinner in our shared kitchen. Sumika, if you read this post – that you for making a company and tasting my mushroom cookings

Boletus Edulis (known as “King Bolete”, “Porcini”, “Cep”, etc.) is the most famous wild edible mushroom known to almost everybody. And I think there is no wild mushroom hunter who doesn’t know this marvelous product of  the Nature. And yet, there is a variation of species among Boletus Edulis which is usually not so widely known. On the one hand, Boletus Edulis is edible and it does not matter what variation of this mushroom you’ve got. On the other hand, it’s interesting to see the difference among Boletus Edulis species.

This October was extremely good for us as we’ve found the two variations of the wild edible Boletus Edulis: Boletus Edulis f.(var.) edulis and Boletus Edulis f.(var.) betulicolus. However, the first one by its location shall be qualified as Boletus Edulis f. (var.) quercicola.

I’m pretty sure many of you have seen both of them although never payed attention to the little differences.

So, here they are

Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis	Boletus Edulis f. (var.) betulicolus
Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis	Boletus Edulis f. (var.) betulicolus

What’s the difference one may ask. Both of those variations are Boletus Edulis and there is not much of the descriptions on their differences. It’s known that the first variation Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis grows mainly in spruce and fir forests. However, the place where we have found this mushroom had oak trees. Boletus edulis variation growing under oak trees is qualified as Boletus edulis f. (var.) quercicola and it has slightly grayish cap color.

Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus grows mainly under the birch trees or in forest with birch trees domination, therefore it has lighter and uneven color of the cap – light brown on edges and darker brown on top. Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis has somewhat more chestnut brown-reddish color of the cap which looks more even than previously described variation.

The cap of Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus has tendency to be more flattened than Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis.

Both variations do have differences in stem look and hight. Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus may be higher than Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis and its stem is more even in its width. In general, it’s a little slimmer than the stem of Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis. The net that covers the stem  of Boletus Edulis f. (var.) betulicolus is white or very light brown when the net of Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis is light brown on top and gets darker closer to the ground.

Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus	Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus
Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus	Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus

In general, I would say that the Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis below is much firmer and reminds a stone by its firmness (Germans call this mushroom “Steinpiltz” – “Stone mushroom” absolutely correctly). It does have a lighter color of pore tubes. Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus on these photos is old, so its pored surface color is kind of greenish. When it’s young the color would be almost white and not as beige as Boletus edulis f. (var.) edulis below.

Boletus species: Boletus edulis f. (var.) edulis second from the left	wet Boletus edulis f. (var.) edulis
Boletus edulis f. (var.) edulis	Boletus edulis f. (var.) edulis

Once you cut Boletus edulis f. (var.) edulis it has the reddish color of cap on the cut edges.

In my archives I have found the photos of Boletus  edulis f. (var.) betulicolus from the last year.

Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus is a big one the left. Small ones are Boletus badius.	Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus
Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus	Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus
Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus	Boletus edulis f. (var.) betulicolus

Since both species are Boletus edulis they are perfectly edible and the the aroma from Boletus edulis f. (var.) edulis is much stronger as well as its taste. I did taste them both raw as I wanted to know the justification behind their name To be honest, I couldn’t stop myself from the whole Boletus edulis f. (var.) edulis raw because of interesting sensation of the raw Boletus Edulis mushroom aroma. It’s kind of lost once this wild mushroom is cooked.

Its texture is pleasant on tongue, it’s firm and just right to bite it properly although it’s not not firm and crunchy as apple for example. However, it’s firmer and more crunchy than cheese, for example. Maybe the bite can be compared with the cucumber’s bite (you know those long-long cucumbers, not the short ones) although it’s not as watery or juicy. In fact, it does not have any juice at all, just like cheese.

The taste is not plain although not spicy as one might like it to be. It is a little bit salty although it might be not salty enough for some people. The level of salt contained in Boletus Edulis may be compared with the fresh celery juice as this juice is a little bit salty in its nature. The most pleasure one gets from enormous aroma explosion in the mouth. It’s like with wine – you smell it before drinking and you feel it after swallowing. With Boletus Edulis you feel it before biting, during chewing and after swallowing.

And I shall say raw wild mushroom Boletus Edulis is quite fulfilling food. Having eaten one raw Boletus Edulis f. (var.) edulis I was nearly full. Having two raw mushrooms would be too much and spoil the pleasure.

Few days later  I have tried fresh raw Boletus Edulis f. (var.) betulicolus and I was not impressed so much. The stem is not worth biting – almost no taste and aroma. The cap had lighter aroma than I had expected. The texture was soft and closer to the cheese texture. However, I keep in mind that the mushroom I’ve tried was not so young. Probably smaller and younger species would be firmer and tastier. If any chance next year (it’s kind of hard to find any Boletus Edulis), will try it again.

Here you are – Vegan Nori Rolls with Wild Mushrooms which correspond to the principles of the Separate Nourishment (no combination of carbohydrates (rice) and proteins (mushrooms)). Therefore, it’s one of my Easy-Digest recipes. As I do not use rice in this recipe I think it’s inappropriate to call this dish “sushi”. So, I use “nori rolls” instead.

Vegan Nori Roll with Wild Mushrooms (Boletus badius and Boletus Edulis)

For 2 servings you will need:

ca. 250 gr of frozen of fresh wild mushrooms (shortly boiled with pinch of salt)
1 medium cucumber
1 small pepper (or paprika)
1 small marrow (optional)
few celery leaves (optional)
1 avocado
few lettuce or other green salad leaves
1 piece of horseradish
kress salad (or other herbs)
1 medium carrot
3-4 Sushi Nori sheets

As mentioned above the mushrooms shall be unfrozen and boiled for about 4-5 minutes in slightly salted water. The vegetables shall be cut in stripes and carrot, marrow, horseradish to be grated. Grated and mixed together marrow and carrot provide a significant amount of juice, so they shall be pressed. Juice can be used in some other dishes or drunk while it’s fresh.

Ingredients for Vegan Nori Rolls with Wild Mushrooms

Ingredients for Vegan Nori Rolls with Wild Mushrooms

As the recipes for the sushi are quite popular on internet you might be already familiar with making rolls technique. It’s pretty simple although needs some practice. The photos below show how I’ve placed the ingredients before I’ve started to roll the nori sheet. There is also a little trick – to lightly sprinkle the part of nori sheet not covered by the vegetables by water as it will help to glue the sheet and keep the roll together.
Then, we take the bambus mat (on this photo the side from the bottom) and supporting the vegetables start to roll. At the end of rolling we’ll get the tube which has to be cut in 5-6 equal one-bite pieces.

Vegetables on Nori for Vegan Rolls with Mushrooms

Vegetables and Mushrooms on Nori sheet

That’s how it looks cut in pieces. On the first photo below you can see the two variations – one with ingredients listed above and the other with beetroot salad (actually leftovers from last dinner) and mushrooms listed above.
Actually, that’s not necessary to use all ingredients at once – you can make different variations using your creativity

Variety of Vegan Nori Rolls with Wild Mushrooms

Vegan Nori Roll with Wild Mushrooms

The Vegan Nori Rolls with Wild Mushrooms shall be served with wasabi, ginger and soy sauce (as it is done for traditional Japanese sushi).

Enjoy your meal!

I’m surfing through internet and I see many posts by successful wild mushroom hunters who like to show off.  As a great fan and forager-lover of mushrooms I like to show my successful harvest myself. However, I believe there is a limit crossing which the “successful harvest” can be called the “outraged harvest”.

mass collection of wild mushrooms

Many people drag tons of wild mushrooms out of woods, and I really mean tons. It’s not just 1-2 wicker baskets for family per week. It’s much, much, much more – like every weekend a car trunk full of collected mushrooms.

mass collection of wild mushrooms

I can hardly believe that a normal person really needs this amount of mushrooms to feed himself and his family. And I hardly believe that one is capable of eating such amounts (which means eating mushrooms for breakfast, lunch and dinner). I can’t believe that in our high-tech era with advanced agriculture there is not enough food and those foragers are starving to death (unless one lives in African country or war zone).

mass preservation of wild mushrooms

The preservation of such huge amounts of mushrooms for later use would mean eating them preserved on a regular basis until the next season. However, such a shift in the diet with dominance of one food over another for a long period of time drains the balance needed to keep our body healthy.

Commercial use of nature gift - wild mushrooms

If the tons of collected mushrooms are intended for sale it does not make anyone good either because too much time will pass until the wild mushrooms from woods will get to the table. The selling on farmers market directly to customer is not always easy, so many mushrooms (e.g. excessive amounts) are being preserved (like dried or frozen) for few years. However, it is known that after about a year the mushrooms loose their quality – there is no so strong aroma any more, they become too dry (in spite of the proper storage conditions which may be guaranteed by professional equipment only) and loose their taste.

Track full of wild mushrooms

In case the selling is done via the centralized distributor, it takes time to collect the mushroom at collection agencies, to sort and package the mushrooms, to distribute them to the shops and to stimulate the customer’s interest to buy them. Very often the mushrooms are staying on the shops shelves without any great attention for several days waiting for their final sigh. They are dying in loneliness. They are not needed. They are abused and thrown away. We shall remember, they are living creatures and gifts of our planet, our nature. Why we don’t care about such valuable gifts?! That’s too cynical and irresponsible to care about our own appetites only. The commercial interest shall not prevail.

I believe the human being is more creative than that and can do better for own business than just use free gifts of nature for own wealth. Sadly, in our so highly-developed and open-minded society it became normal to earn money on everything what one can get for free.

P.S. For those who might think that I write this out of jealousy I’d like to ensure you that we have enough wild mushrooms of our own and we care about nature (we use just one mushroom basket for collecting wild edible mushrooms). In one of my articles “How much wild mushrooms to preserve?” I show how to calculate how much of fresh mushrooms is needed by a family of 2 adults.

P.P.S. Yes, I am aware that mushrooms spores are distributed better when we collect the mushrooms (spores are distributed with help of wind) and carry some spores throughout the forest on our boots. However, that argument does not justify the avarice, greed and cruelness towards the nature.

However, I did not do just nothing – I was doing research. There is a saying “We are what we eat” (or something like this). And the meaning of this saying is not clear unless you have some health issues or challenges to take care of. I think it’s very bad that the person starts to dig into this topic rather later than sooner. No worries, nothing critical has happened to me, I just have decided to look carefully to my health and find the causes of some issues I have for years. We all got used to some occasional headaches, stomach and/or indigestion problems (and many others) which we always find a reason for – too much stress, bad environment, not enough vitamins, etc.

Fresh banano-apple-strawberry juice

Reading the books of Dr. Norman Walker “The natural way to vibrant health“ and “Fresh Vegetable and Fruit Juices” I have realized that the main cause of mostly all health and mental troubles is food. I think nowadays all people are aware that sugars, white flour, processed food (pre-cooked pasta dinners, pizzas, etc.), beverages (coca-cola, fanta, etc.), alcohol,  canned products (canned beans, corn, etc.), chocolate, deep-fried food (french fries, nuggets, etc.), meat products (meat, sausages, ham, etc.) are not healthy. There is plenty of information on all these foods on internet and Dr. Walker clearly explains in his books how these products are being processed by human body and what are the consequences (yes, for anything we eat there are consequences, which we might not notice, ignore or misinterpret).

Organic garden herbs

So, having all mentioned food removed from the diet what we get is wild edible mushrooms (and other wild edibles), vegetables, fruits, dairy products, eggs, fish, seafood and grains (plus, products from grains), nuts, seeds, herbs, oils. That is usually called a healthy vegetarian diet. I follow this vegetarian diet for the last 7 years.

As agriculture has developed most advanced techniques to support the consumer market with as much food as people don’t need (I’ve seen myself a lot of food is thrown away once there is an expiry date, so shops have more than people buy), it uses the hormones to stimulate the high production of milk, eggs, fish, seafood and genetic modifications to introduce the “fast growing-all deceases resistant-nothing valuable containing” vegetables, fruits, plants and grains. As result,  many of these foods are affecting the hormone and vitamins/minerals level in human body and as consequence generate most of the problems with liver, blood pressure, skin, kidney, gallbladder and digestion system. The logical conclusion here would be to exclude all products of animal origin and use the organic vegetables and fruits. This diet is known as vegan. Basically it includes the wild mushrooms, berries and plants, fruits, vegetables, grains, beans and soy products, seeds, nuts, oils, herbs.

Home baked fermented sourdough bread sandwich with salt, raw avocado, marrow, tomato and sprouts

However, having studied the vegan diet I’ve came to the conclusion that it’s not the answer to all questions and the solution for all problems. In fact, it often leads to other problems with health because of high consumption of grains, beans and soy products (all contain large amounts of phytic acid which form insoluble combinations with Magnesium, Calcium, Iron, Zinc and generate the deficit of those minerals). Nuts, oils and seeds do not provide large amounts of Omega-3 and Omega-6 acids which are essential for our bodies. I’ve read some posts by ex-vegans and raw foodists about their health problems and came to conclusion that there is no single formula to health, that’s all about keeping the proper balance.

The most healthy diet would be based on raw organic vegetables and fruits (of course, it’s expensive and at the moment we vary organic and non-organic products), wild edible mushrooms, plants, herbs, organic or/and wild berries, oils, seeds and nuts (in small amounts), occasionally organic/wild fish and seafood. Grains and beans can be eaten if they are sprouted or cooked after soaking in water for 8-12 hours. And it’s better to have soy product on occasional basis rather than frequently use them. The more fresh (raw) food you eat, the better it is. I try to keep the 70/30 or 80/20 principle (70-80% of raw and 20-30% of cooked food).

Fried sweet potato with raw vegetables

So, as such, I have to say goodbye to my idea about dehydrator as we do not plan to use extensively dried food in our diet. Now instead of drying (which kills most of the valuable vitamins and minerals at high temperatures) I prefer freezing preservation, so we have to think about a bigger freezer :)

In fact, wild edible mushrooms are suitable for any diet you follow (even to raw diet as some mushrooms can be eaten raw) although I would still advise to cook wild edible mushrooms before consumption – our inner organs are fragile to play hard on them. I know that raw diet followers are using mushrooms regularly and in most cases mushrooms are partially dehydrated (exposed to high temperature which apparently cooks them) before usage in raw dishes.

By the way, I’ve tried a new dish – Raw Nori rolls with Wild Mushrooms and it was delicious! I’ll share the recipe and photos soon

For this dish (for 2 servings) you will need:

3 middle-sized marrow – fiber
1 middle-sized onion – fiber
200gr of fresh of frozen Boletus badius and/or Suillus granulatus (or any other Suillus) mushrooms – protein
1 garlic – fiber
greenery – dill, green onion, etc.

1. Marrows shall be washed and skin should be peeled off. Each marrow should be cut in halves longwise and each half shall be accurately cleaned from insides by small knife.
2. Mushrooms shall be washed and brought to boil in the pot. The white foam forming before boiling shall be trimmed off.
3. Once the mushrooms are boiled for 1 minute they shall be placed in a frying pan together with cut in cubes onion and crashed garlic and fried for 2 minutes. Then, the insides of marrow shall be added, mixed, salted and fried for 3 more minutes.

Marrow flesh chopped and prepared for cooking with mushrooms

Prepared filling from mushrooms and marrow flesh

4. Now we have to fill the marrows. Use a little of olive oil to lubricate the form where you will put the filled marrows. Place the mushroom filling in marrows and arrange marrows in the form. When all marrows are in the form, place it in oven on 180C for 20 minutes.
5. Serve with fresh vegetables and greenery!

Marrow filled with mushrooms prepared for oven

Marrow filled with Bay and Weeping Bolete mushrooms

If you plan to eat this dish along with other dish make sure that your meal is made of vegetables and proteins and does not include the combinations of various fats, carbohydrates, etc.

Enjoy your meal!

This is the last post of this year and I would like to thank everyone who reads, emails and comments me. We go through the learning process together and we get new knowledge and experiences. For those who love wild mushrooms picking them is a hobby which lasts for the whole life (as I mentioned in my earlier posts, it’s an addiction – be careful! ) So, it’s never ending process of learning fungi. And I have so much to share with you! I hope the New Year will give us more opportunistes to help and teach each other!

I have started this blog in February 2011 with an idea to share the knowledge and experience I have with other interested in wild edible mushrooms hunting and to find people who have the same passion about edible mushrooms as me. And I am glad I did. Today is December 30th and I have readers from all over the world except of some African countries, Mongolia, Kazakhstan and few Arabic countries But I understand they might have other interests. I’m glad to get your comments and that my blog is interesting and useful. I plan to continue to post about my mushroom experiences whenever I have free time. So, if you don’t see new posts or don’t get my reply quickly, it’s not because I don’t like or ignore it. Perhaps, I just have busy times

The New Year for me will start with juice fasting during January and February as I’m in a constant process to find the best way to take care of my body (our bodies are so fragile and break easily if not treated properly ). Yes, that would be a challenge to fast for 2 months to clean my body from various toxins but I think it’s worth to try it. When the body is cleaner I can start a new food program

This post is short as I would not like to keep you long in front of whatever device with internet access you have. So, I wish you to have a successful and creative new year 2012, keep good mood and feeling throughout the whole year, share your joy and happiness with your family and friends and, of course, have a good mushroom season and marvelous harvest! Happy New Year!

Fresh raw champignons as a starter

The first day on our arrival to Buenos Aires we’ve visited local vegetable/fruit store (in Spanish”Verdulería-Frutería”) where we’ve noticed cultivated champignons on sale. In fact, in some places in Argentina those champignons are served raw as a part of the starter or salad (which surprised us a lot as we have not seen raw mushrooms in any dishes of any public places in European countries). Unfortunately, the lack of Spanish language knowledge did not allow us to explain our question about where we could find wild mushrooms to the sales man. However, I kept trying asking in all the places we have visited in Argentina (one might think I’m a mushroom maniac asking everywhere about wild mushrooms )

So, out next stop was one of touristic places – Puerto Madryn (on the Atlantic Ocean cost) where we’ve planed to watch whales, pinguins, sea elephants, sea lions, guanacos and any other available animals If you look on the Google map of Argentina you’ll notice that the most of Southern part (everything what is in the Southern direction from Buenos Aires) is flat which means that it looks totally deserted – endless sandy land with little bushes and strong winds moving that sand in all directions. The mountains and some greenery is located on the West of Argentina (on the border with Chile). So, there was no chance we could find any hongos silvestres in the area of Puerto Madryn. During the excursion to the Natural Reserve Peninsula Valdes our guide has told us one possible place where we could find wild mushrooms – Esquel. I’ve kept this name in my memory.

On our last day in Puerto Madryn during the walk through this little, cosy town on the shore we’ve came across the very nice store “Barrika” (Av. Julio A. Roca 109) where they sell wines, sweets, herbal and berries tea, jars with various preserved delicatessen. Among other things we’ve found jars with wild mushrooms pate (so I could not resist and bought one for us) and the little plastic bags with dried wild mushrooms. What surprised me that there was no clear indication what mushrooms those were. The label just said “Hongos silvestres” As I have figured out later it’s very typical for Argentina to avoid clear indications on the mushrooms. According to my personal experience I would say that they were either Leccinum or Suillus species because they were the slices of pored mushrooms which got dark during drying process (Boletus edulis never darkens during drying). Anyway, having wild mushrooms pate was enough for us In fact, we have tasted it later and it was really great! I liked it a lot.

The cover of Wild Mushroom Pate packaging

The ingredients of the Wild Mushroom Pate – in case someone wants to make it at home

The next stop of our trip through Patagonia was little town El Calafate which exists mainly from the tourism (it’s famous by its Glaciers National Parks) and where on the Minitrekking excursion to Glacier Perito Moreno we’ve met Luis.

Our guide – mushroom hunter Luis

As it turned out Luis is a great mushroom lover and on the top of Perito Moreno where we’ve climbed with crampons attached to our boots he has told us that yes, the wild mushrooms can be found in this region. So, at the end of October (which corresponds to April in Northern hemisphere) he has gathered a basket of Morels in El Chalten area. We have agreed that next time he’ll make photos and share it with us.

It seems that Boletus species can also be found there (e.g. Boletus edulis – Cep, Porcino or in Spanish “Seta calabaza”).

Talking about wild mushrooms in Patagonia

So, having confirmation on the wild mushrooms growing in the woods along the border with Chili and hoping to find some of them we have moved to Esquel – the area where lots of pine trees are growing.  In fact, we could see a lot of those trees on the excursion to the National Park Los Alerces. And, I’ve been lucky to find an edible parasitic mushroom which grows on trees – in the past native Argentinians were eating it and gave a name to this mushroom “Shau-Shau” which means “tasty”

Though Luis has told us that he tried it and it’s plain in taste and does not justify its name

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

I did some search on internet and have found that the scientific name for this mushrooms is Cyttaria darwinii (Darwin’s fungus). Here is a good description of this Darwin’s fungus Unfortunately, no other fungi than that were found but I guess it’s because that was a spring (the main season for pored mushrooms at the end of summer – autumn).

In the Esquel’s supermarkets we could see the plastic bags named “Hongos silvestres” with dried pored mushrooms though they had white mold. In fact, the same story was in Mendoza – our next destination. Plus, in one case the content of the package was indicated as Boletus luteus which is wrong because this mushrooms was re-classified and currently is called Suillus luteus. So, to me it seems that people in Argentina do not care how the mushrooms are called and what quality of those mushrooms shall be. Selling the dried mushrooms with mold is direct way to possible poisoning (an expensive way as you have to pay money for that ) In Mendoza they have few shops which are dedicated to the dietary products, so they sell mostly various spices, grains, flour and some protein products for body builders In all those shops we could find same dried pored mushrooms as we’ve seen in plastic bags in supermarkets though one can buy them by weight. The quality of these dried mushrooms is not the best. And only in one shop we have found dried Boletus edulis sold by weight.

All the land of Argentina has ownership and access is restricted by the fences, so there is no easy access to any forest around. The only way to get to the woods is to pay the ticket to the Natural Reserve. On the other hand it sounds weird – to pay the ticket to get to the Reserved place to collect wild mushrooms (Reserve suppose that you cannot collect there anything). However, that is how most of local people are doing. On the excursion to the Park Los Alecers our group was taken to the little souvenir shop on the Park territory where the owner (descendant of the Polish immigrants) explained that dried and preserved in glass jars wild mushrooms he sells are collected in this park.

As a conclusion to our wild mushrooms investigation in Argentina I would say that if you know Spanish language and the right people who can guide you to the wild places it’s worth to hunt for wild mushrooms there.

There are plenty of online resources which offer endless mushroom courses for beginners or foraging trips. However there are not so many (free) resources which try to educate people unfamiliar with mushrooms. I think it’s a shame because the more people know about edible mushrooms the less there will be wrong identifications and poisoning cases.

Yes, there are online resources which represent some kind of mushroom encyclopedia of all fungi which exist. I respect experts which write there however for the person who is interested just to make a mushroom soup from wild mushroom probably it’s not the best way to start learning wild edible mushrooms. So, I have decided to put my knowledge on some wild edible mushrooms via this blog hoping that people will learn some basic things on the mushroom hunting without getting into mushroom science. The information on this blog is free (I will appreciate if you put a link to this blog when re-posting info from it) and comes from my personal experience on foraging for years (you see I’m still alive, so I have not made mistakes )

Coming back to mistakes. As I said it’s difficult to make mistake if there is a knowledge. I think that beginners should start with learning one-two particular wild edible mushrooms (where they grow, how they look, what are the criteria to recognize them, what they are good for) BEFORE going on any mushroom hunting. From my point of view, the easiest mushrooms to learn are pored edible mushrooms. There are very-very-very low chances to make mistakes with pored edible mushrooms if the homework is done properly.

Though the expectations should be right. That’s not possible to become a mushroom expert over night or learn dozens of edible mushrooms in a short period of time. It takes years to learn and practice your knowledge in the forest. Nevertheless, don’t be discouraged – you will most probably find wild mushrooms already on your first mushroom hunting trip.

Therefore, from my point of view, most fears in false mushroom identification come from the laziness to learn properly because it takes time to find reliable source of information. It takes time to make a certain plan how and what to learn. It takes time to actually look through the information on one particular mushroom species. It takes time to understand and memorize that and of course, it takes time to practice this knowledge in the forest.

The basic idea is – learn everything about one edible pored mushroom, wait for the season (autumn is a season for mostly all edible pored mushrooms) and go to the forest looking just for this one mushroom (ignoring any other mushrooms on the way). When you succeed with this mushroom (feel comfortable about picking it in the forest and cooking afterwards), learn the next edible pored mushroom. Gradually, few pored mushrooms will be learned and known well. The next level of education could be to learn some edible gill mushrooms (one by one).

The learning process is endless, so I would say that mushroom hunting is a never ending story I wish you a lot of patience and persistency. The one who really wants to learn about edible wild mushrooms, will succeed. I’m sure about it.

- the less you cook (anything – mushrooms, vegetables, etc.) the more vitamins and minerals are still there
- after mushroom hunting during several morning hours no one wants to spend whole afternoon cooking them

So, my recipes with fresh mushrooms are as simple for cooking as possible and require minimum time. Also this dish is easy for digestion because it’s a combination of protein (mushrooms) and fiber (vegetables).

For 4 servings of the soup is required:

• 200-250 gr of fresh edible mushrooms (Bay Bolete, Weeping Bolete, or any other Bolete) – protein
• 1/2 of onion – fiber
• 1 medium-size carrot – fiber
• 1 sweet paprika – fiber
• 2 pieces of garlic – fiber
• 1-2 big tomato - fiber
• 1 table spoon of olive oil – fat
• 2-3 bay leaves - fiber
• 1 dill  twig - fiber
• 1 green onion - fiber
• punch of sea salt

Ingredients for the fresh mushroom soup

1. Cleaned and cut pieces of bolete mushrooms together with bay leaves are placed in cold water in a pot and brought to boil without lid on a high heat.

2. After the water started to boil, the pot should be covered with a lid and taken from the heat to pour boiling water into bassin (because Bay Bolete darkens and change the water to dark during preparation) . The new cold water should be added to the pot and the pot with lid should be placed again on a high heat to boil (if you are OK with dark water in a soup no need to change the water).

Cut pieces of fresh Bay and Weeping bolete

Boiling fresh Bay Bolete and Weeping Bolete mushroom pieces

3. While mushrooms in the pot come to boil slice the vegetables: onion – in little cubes, carrot – grated, pepper – in a little pieces, garlic – in tiny pieces (I used garlic pressor), tomato – in one-bite pieces.

Prepared for cooking vegetables

Fresh dill and green onion

4. When the mushrooms start to boil (second time after water change, or first time without water change) all vegetables are added to the pot at once, plus 1 table spoon of olive oil and sea salt. The heat should be reduced to the medium. Leave it cooking for 15 minutes.

5. Take the pot from the heat and leave aside for next 10 minutes.

6. Add cut dill and green onion and serve.

Soup from fresh wild mushrooms - Bay Bolete and Weeping Bolete

Soup from fresh wild mushrooms - Bay Bolete and Weeping Bolete

The soup can be eaten with sour cream. If you plan to combine it with another dish, make sure that your meal has only proteins and fiber. Otherwise, combination of all possible food (e.g. pizza, beer, soup with mushrooms, etc.) can lead to difficult digestion.

Enjoy your meal!