Fun with Fungus

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Two words- bumper crop. These several syllables are enough to make me grab my rain jacket, hiking boots, and a five gallon bucket for a quick trip to Olympia, Washington.

Chanterelles (cantharellus cibarius), start popping up in the Pacific Northwest in autumn and continue to bloom, especially after heavy precipitation, until the first heavy frost. Every season is different, but this year will be talked about by local mycophiles for some time. "Remember the windfall of 2010," they will wistfully say, recounting the haul.
The sizable mushrooms yield this season is possibly due to the unusually wet summer, but then again, there are a plethora of other factors at play- fungi are a mysterious eukaryote and can be hard to predict when, where, and in what quantity they will pop up, if at all. Whatever the contributing factors may be, there are a lot of mushrooms out there ready for the picking this season. But before one goes tromping out into the woods with high hopes and a bucket, you should know how to identify the mushroom you are hunting and hopefully gathering. It is important to know the physical appearance of the fungus in question and the specific habitat type in which it can be found. Better yet, go with someone who knows what the heck they are talking about.

For wild mushroom hunters, Chanterelles, along with Morels, Oyster Mushrooms, and Puff Balls are some of the most popular types of mushrooms to gather and are pretty difficult to misidentify. However, only the most knowledgeable and experienced gatherer should collect from the hard to identify and toxic groups, such as Amanita.

So here's the skinny on cantharellus cibarius...
The Chanterelle are a strictly wild mushroom- mycologists have yet to successfully cultivate them. Chanterelles are a vibrant yellow-orange mushroom with a slightly convex cap that can be up to 7 inches across. The gills stretch from the stem all the way to the frilled edges of the cap. A mature specimen is funnel-shaped with no separation between stem and cap. I read somewhere that this particular fungi supposedly smells like apricots, but I found that they smell vaguely of, well, mushrooms- that is, sort of damp and musty.

Chanterelles live in a symbiotic relationship with live trees, gathering pre-photosynthesized carbohydrates while the tree in turn, is provided with additional moisture and minerals. In Western Washington, Chanterelles are most commonly found in forests dominated by grand fir in highly precipitous areas.

The correct method of harvesting Chanterelles is as follows...

1. Find them!

2. Cut the cap and part of the stem out of the ground, leaving a portion still connected to the mycelium network. This helps ensure that the patch will keep producing.

3. Leave teeny-tiny and old, soggy-looking specimens in the ground. You don't want them, I promise.

4. Plop the freshly harvested mushroom in your bucket and get them home before they get slimy.

5. Once safely home, removed humus and other debris.

6. Cook or dehydrate immediately to prevent spoilage.

Historically speaking, mushroom hunters were often aided by the use of a truffle pig- a domestic swine trained to smell out and extract particularly fragrant fungi, even as low as three feet underground. We were fresh out of truffle pigs, so Josie the Rott-mix hopped in the back of the rig and got to be our truffle hound. In this photo, we were playing fetch during out mid-day oyster harvesting break along the Hood Canal.
After the mid-day break for sunshine, oysters, and fetch, we trudged back to the less sunny, more drippy mushroom spot. There were tons of other frilly, lumpy, fuzzy, slimy, colorful, but all interesting mushrooms along the way. Here are some good examples of what Chanterelles do NOT look like.
Mushroom hunting and gathering has become increasingly more competitive with the rise of commercial pickers, due to the push for more organic, local, wild, etc., etc., foods in grocery stores. With this stiff competition, longtime mushroom mongers guard their secret spots jealously. I offered to dawn a blindfold for the drive, as to ensure I wouldn't return to plunder the spot, but my guide just giggled and said she "doubted I would be able to find my way back." So that is the story and I'm sticking to it, so don't ask. I couldn't find my way back if I tried.
All in all, we picked 45 lbs. of Chanterelles and had a full day of fun with fungus. This haul will keep me mycophagous for some time to come.

Welcome to your weekend! -KB