I’ve always been slightly enamored and mystified by the myriad of funky fungi I’ve encountered throughout years of adventuring outdoors, but have never been interested in learning more about wild mushrooms due to my lifelong distaste of Portobello or baby bello mushrooms found at any random grocery store.
I’ve always hated that I hated mushrooms, but what can one do?!
So as you can imagine, going out to enjoy a lovely solo hike in Chattanooga to get some fresh air and coming home with a large sampling of one of Mother Nature’s most nutritious, sustainable, and, as I later learned, delicious offerings completely unexpectedly has really opened up a whole new world for me.
You’re probably wondering what possessed me to pluck a random, though beautiful, unknown cluster of fungus from the woods and take it home to eat with practically no experience in the matter, especially knowing how dangerous decisions like that could be….
Well, two things: for one I had just seen that amazingly edited and incredibly interesting documentary Fantastic Fungi with the world famous mycologist Paul Stamets who really explained just what miraculous entities mushrooms are and how truly delicious they can be, which reminded me of the only time I have ever foraged and eaten a wild mushroom previously, and made me yearn to try again.
My first time eating a wild forage was with my good friend Jimi who is an old pro and knew exactly what he was doing. We collected this lionsmane mushroom together, then sautéed it with butter and salt n pepper and it was EPIC! It literally tasted like a meaty, succulent cross between a squash and a shrimp.
Happening upon that perfect specimen and then eating it less than 3 hours later felt all the more epic because my whole life I always had to let people know that I didn’t like mushrooms if they were providing a shared meal.
I mean…. I’ll still have to let folks who prep my food know my tastes… but at least now I can sound like an elitist hipster and say, ‘I only like wild mushrooms.’ tee hee
But I digress.. the reason I even gathered this particular mushroom was because it was so beautiful I took a pic and sent it to my friend who watched the movie with me and he immediately came back telling me it was a delicious mushroom called Chicken of the Woods and I should collect it. I had a hand towel with me so I broke it off the decaying branch it was growing out of and kept on my hike. My friend and I continued to check with a few folks to be sure it was safe and good and I watched a few videos on YouTube too.
I brought it home, cleaned it off, and sautéed half of it in a little Bragg sauce then included it in a veggie Thai lemongrass meal (see me cook and taste it in this quickie video here>>). And wouldn’t you know it, the Chicken of the Woods was epic too, and so aptly named!! The next day I did a barbeque olive oil recipe I found online and yummmmmmm! The consistency is so spot on and it just the mushroom just really takes on whatever seasoning you’re trying to give it. I’m hooked!
All in all though, I am seriously grateful to have a new healthy food group to enjoy. So much so that I even took the plunge and included some oyster mushrooms in my Misfits Market box this week. I found a recipe for those with just olive oil, garlic, green onions, salt n pepper, and lemon juice that was quite delightful. I’d have to say I liked the foraged fungus better than the oysters, but they were pretty good and I’ll definitely eat them again. At some point I’d like to see about growing my own, I hear it’s not that difficult.
You see those lil brown dots at the base? They’re tiny mushrooms! My mushrooms are growing their own mushrooms - ha!
Do you like wild mushrooms? Have you ever foraged your own? How about grown your own? Let me know or share tips in the comments!
9.16.2021