Unexpected bounty
It’s been a great wild mushroom year already. We have eaten our fill and carefully tucked some away in the freezer for the winter. So I was pleasantly surprised to see these the other day when I went to do the daily paddock shift for the cows.
A new flush of mushrooms means all best laid plans are off. The apples that were waiting while I worked on the beans, are still waiting. A day in the forest hunting mushrooms is more fun than canning applesauce anyway.
Luckily I had chili on the back of the cookstove, so no meal worries.
And to ease my guilt about the apples, I made a rustic apple pie - peels, blemishes and all!
So now in addition to the windfall apples that I do need to process, I have lots more Chanterelle mushrooms too. We do eat well, I can say that much!
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Food Renegade
Simple, Green, Frugal Co-op
YUM!! How do you process them to store in the freezer? I’ve tried to freeze morels (although we rarely have enough to worry about!)but haven’t been satisfied with the results.
Judy, we have tried dehydrated and canned and didn’t care for the results. So I just saute them in butter, season with salt and pepper, cool and freeze in 8 oz jars. Of course they don’t taste like the ones we are eating fresh, but they are very good. Frozen in the jars they will not freezer burn or get that taste of plastic from the freezer. Such a treat in various dishes.
This was one of the best years we have ever had for morel mushrooms, much better than the previous two, and I was able to dry copious amounts of them. We have yet to run across any chanterelle mushrooms though, ever, I’m pretty sure they are here we just have to work on our timing. Unfortunately for us, many of our favorite stomping grounds are full of hunters this time of year. My poor wife gets freaked out enough in the spring when we have to dodge the bear hunters and those poor dogs of theirs. We’ll keep looking.
That is a very fine looking pie.
Mike, it is the opposite here, I haven’t found a morel in years – maybe not enough deciduous trees here? There are lots of edible mushrooms here, but the chanterelles are the most abundant, taste great, and preserve the best. We pass over the others.
I hear you on the hunters – it’s blaze vests for us and the dogs and I pack heat, just in case. We find more people stealing mushrooms from us, than hunters hunting and most of the time the trespassers are much more belligerent than the hunters. Actually the worst hunters are the bow hunters – because a rifle shot will give someone away, whereas you can sneak into someone’s orchard and hunt with a bow and you may not be detected. I have never figured out the logic behind trespassers anyway – I guess everything is just there for the taking, as long as you don’t get caught.
That pie was pretty tasty, and whittled down my apple glut a little
I remember, as a small child, living in NE Washington state, my father would come home from the woods, (he was a logger) and tell mama it was time for the mushrooms. My four brothers and I would go to the woods with them, several milk cans in tow, and pick for hours. I can still taste the fried mushrooms. I think the picture you have up conjered the taste in my mouth again! Thanks for posting, Elaine
Elaine, it was my brother and uncle who got me started on mushrooms and they were loggers too! The taste and smell of woods brought home
ooo I wish I had chantrelles (or morels!) on my own place! I do have a big patch of shaggy manes which come back year after year, and they are yummy fresh, but I haven’t found a way to store them yet. They always melt into puddles of black goo. Unappetizing.
Aimee, it’s funny how some just don’t translate after the initial fresh stage. The Chanterelles and Morels hold up the best for preserving. All this Morel talk is making me hungry though. I laugh when people tell me I should sell them, it’s too hard of work for a little cash!
I’m DROOLING! Alas, I hear Chanterelles are hard to come by here. Morels, now, that’s a different matter. And I do have an apple orchard, so I can hope…
Forced myself to wait until I arrived here to purchase Paul Stamets’ book, Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms and am determined… if morels don’t appear on their own this spring, I’ll buy some spawn and try making some beds in the orchard. They’d be a lovely permaculture addition.
Hayden, our Morels always came up in the orchard or near the burn pile. We moved the burn pile, so none there, and I’m thinking because we now treat the orchard like a lawn and mow it more often we have chased the Morels away
Stamet’s book is a good read!
It’s really cold here this morning and I could use a big bowl of that chili. I’ve never ate one of those mushrooms. How do you cook them? I’d expect you just fry’em up like morels. I also wanted to say that my five year old son just saw your apple pie and said that he’d sure like to have a piece of that pie.
Darrell, that chili does warm a person up
Just fried up in butter is the best way to eat the Chanterelles, and I’m with your kid, I would like a piece of that pie right now – except I have to go bake another one to make that happen!
Sounds like you had a great Chanterelle harvest.
The Chanterelle’s were great this year on central Vancouver Island BC. too.
Picture fresh spring grass, a coughing cow, then watch this;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZI555S4HuM
I roared! Stuff Happens.
Hello,
Just wanted to say hi, and thanks for all the great blogging. I still drop in most every day to read about what you are doing, and why – it’s interesting, inspirational, and educational.
Kjersti