Wild Mushrooms - Growing Mushrooms - Free Food

Free Food - well that conjures up a giggle for sure! All food is free until you liberate it.

It is the end of mushroom season here. Mushroom picking is so fun I am sorry to see it end. There is nothing sweeter than traipsing through the forest, over trunks and under brush, lured by the glimpse of fungi on the horizon. What a work out, what a thrill, and that is even before the eating starts.



The mushroom is not a plant, but rather the fruit of a "plant" that grows under ground all year long. Underground it can be huge. When you disturb soil in the forest you will see there are white strings all through it. This is the what the "plant" really looks like and can be miles large and hundreds of years old. As you can imagine there many of varieties of mushrooms, but strangely the same mushrooms grow on different continents. For example a maitake mushroom here is identical to one in Romania.



Both these uglies are supposed to be edible, but not choice. Would you eat them?


Mushrooms bring rare amino acids and valueable immune building protein to the diet. If we were to gorge on the foods available where we live, when they are available I am sure we would ward off seasonal viruses. Mushrooms are an excellent case in point, used in this way by Asian cultures for centuries. Nutritional information found here



This is a boletes, supposed to be excellent eating. I have lots of them and I pick a could every year, but as of yet haven't got the guts to try it.



These are pine mushrooms which were plentiful this year. I grate them fine so they can be slipped into dishes unnoticed by picky eaters, then off to the freezer.



I am new at mushroom picking and learn from others on the net. An excellent blog to follow for mushrooms is Fat of the Land. To learn about mushrooms